We Are Children of the Free Woman

Listen, my job, as Roger gave it to me, is to apply what we've looked at in the first part of this in terms of the free woman and the allegory and the woman in bondage. And I'm going to start in verse 29 where it says, But as at that time, He who was born according to the flesh persecuted him that was born according to the Spirit. Interesting little phrase. And so it is now also. Still going on. So it's interesting that this all happened on the day that Isaac was weaned and Ishmael mocked him. Ishmael was what, 14 years old or something like that,

15. And he was the one, Ishmael, born according to the flesh. And he was the one under bondage to the law system as we've learned. And he was the one who persecutes the one born after the Spirit or born after grace. So, and it's interesting in Genesis 21 where this comes from.

Here, I'm going to read a couple, three verses to you. Now Sarah saw the son of Hagar, the Egyptian, whom she had born to Abraham, mocking. She observes this activity going on. And therefore she said to Abraham, drive out this maid and her son, for the son of the maid shall not be an heir with my son Isaac. So Abraham rose early in the morning and he took bread and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar, putting them on her shoulder and gave her the boy and sent her away. And she departed and wandered about in the wilderness of Beersheba." You know, it's one thing to get Ostracized from your family is another thing that your prospects in Beersheba aren't too good. What do you do out there? It's just desert.

But the allegory here shows that what Paul is talking about is that the Judaizers and those who were leaning that way were persecuting Paul. All those who would not abandon grace for law. And I don't know if you're like me, but I experience that in my Christian life all the time. If I present a grace message sitting around with friends that are believers, but are law-based, you know, right away there's a tension.

Right away there's a pushback that happens. And in this case, the Spirit of God sees what's going on with Ishmael, And his expression was an ingrained and incurable hatred of the flesh for the spirit. We all have sin natures and we've all been around with them long enough to realize that it isn't going to compromise. It's always going to push back. It's always going to want its way. It is never going to align itself with your position in Christ or your new life in Christ.

And Paul the apostle knew a lot about this. Because he started out a preacher of the circumcision, right? He was hunting down Christians and he was zealous. But if he continued teaching that way, he wouldn't have had any problem with the Jews at all. They would have welcomed him with open arms. They would have put honor on the first man and said, Paul's our guy. There wouldn't be any persecution that follows him.

But we know from studying the gospels, I'm sorry, the epistles, that wherever he went, these legal people were after him. They couldn't live with the grace. So he was a faithful minister of heavenly things and had to endure all the consequences in his person and circumstances that he found himself in.

There's a lot of people that understand what's going on here. And I would say that a lot in contemporary Christianity, there's a compromise with legalism by leaders because then they don't get persecuted. If you are a grace-based person, part of what comes with that job is that there's going to be persecution about it. You're going to be hassled, is probably a good contemporary word, just like Isaac was. So people who contend for the law, and just a little bit, or ordinances, are bitter against and prosecute those who are the true seed of God.

That's just the way it is. It isn't a story that Paul is making up. It's the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit has strong desires of the flesh. They're contrary to one another, so that I can't do what I want to do. In other words, the flesh and law go together, the Spirit and grace go together, and they can't be mixed. They're opposite ends of the spectrum.

So what's going to happen here? The cases of this incident with Ishmael and Hagar and Sarah and Isaac show the principle of really what goes on practically in an everyday life. So an expanded translation would be, just as then, he who was born according to the flesh was constantly persecuting him who was born according to the Spirit, so also it is now. I forgot to slide one. We've already went over that. So now we're on slide two.

Verse 30 says, so what does the scripture say? Probably the greatest question any of us can ever ask if someone approaches us about information. We should say back to them, what does the scripture say? We're so great at our own opinion that we forget to say that. But we should go in the Word of God and spend time in the Word of God and let it do its job. Here's what the Scripture says about this.

Cast out the bondwoman and her son. Why? For the son of the bondwoman shall not be an heir with the son of the free woman. Now, so this is Sarah. Sarah says, drive out this maid and her son. And he shall not be an heir with my son Isaac. In Genesis 21.11, here's how Abraham responded to that. He said, the matter distressed Abraham greatly because of his son.

Trust me, your old man and your legalism, you really like it. You don't want to cast it out. But that's what the Word says. Then God had to come. You know, last week Roger talked about Adam and Eve, and Eve was the one who said, here, take a bite. Trying to put the scorn on the, you know, my wife's a problem. Well, look what God does to Abraham here. In verse 12 he says, but God said to Abraham, Don't be distressed because of the lad and your mind.

Whatever Sarah tells you, listen to her. Listen to her. So you guys, listen. For through Isaac your descendants shall be named. So the point is that your wife has good advice sometimes. You've got to listen to her. But if she offers you fruit, the Word of God plainly says, drive out this maid, for her son shall not be an heir.

There's a couple of things here that you can't stick together or you can't unite together. The first one is, If a man is to be an heir, he's not going to do it through law. You can't perform your way into heirship. Then he's not an heir, then he would not be. And if you could do that, you wouldn't be an heir by promise or by grace.

You would have obtained righteousness and blessing by your own efforts. And that's mostly what's taught today in Christianity, your efforts. And receiving it by grace through faith, it's a free gift. And law and free gift can't go together. Do you see how they're different? Law is a real simple concept.

If you obey me, I will bless you. If you don't obey me, I will withdraw the blessing or I will curse you. What does grace say? Grace says real simple, because I've already blessed you, you will obey me. Because we have the life to obey. We have the freedom to do it.

But these two concepts, all through these verses, are opposed to one another and can't coexist properly within. And this is Ishmael. This is what he's all about. He's all about, he's the son of the flesh, he's the son of legalism, and he's the son of performance. And the Galatians must learn that this must be their share also if they persist on the ground of the flesh.

They're going to be just like Him. They're not going to be heirs of the promise. There can't be any blessing for them because God won't share His glory. The greatest gift we have is that God has put us in Christ for the purpose of us sharing His glory. If you could put yourself in there, then you could go to God and say, well, listen, I earned some of your glory. That isn't how He works. He's happy to share it with you, but you have to earn it by just receiving it, by just believing it, and receiving the grace.

Is there anything harder to do than receive? It's the most difficult thing there is. Totally difficult. I just spent a couple of days on vacation with family and Dr. Eccle. He insisted on putting the gas in the car. And I always kept thinking, what can I do to pay him back? That's the way we think, like Ishmael. We don't just say, OK, Bob, you can pay for the gas. Thank you very much. Paul, in interpreting the allegory, says that the rejection of Ishmael points to a rejection of the children of Abraham after the flesh in favor of those children who are Abraham after faith.

One of the common commenters that I found said that law and the gospel can't coexist. I don't care what those little bumpers say, coexist. The law and the gospel can't coexist. The law has to disappear. before the gospel, in front of the gospel. It's scarcely possible to estimate the strength of conviction and depth of prophetic insight which this declaration implies. Paul says confidently, he says confidently that grace sounds the death knell to Judaism. The death knell. Judaism is over with. Put it another way, it's set aside until grace, all of us who are grace have come in. If you cling to the Mosaic Law, you will miss it. Now you may be a believer saved by grace, but you'll miss the blessing while you're here if you live under a law system.

The truth which to us appears a truism must then have been regarded as a paradox. I think Paul trying to explain to the Galatians about grace was really a paradox to them. They were trying to understand what he meant because not only does all society have a set of rules and mores that they live by, but they also have a religion which is law-based and here comes the Apostle Paul and starts telling them about grace. It's got to be a tough thing to accept. It's a hard thing for us to accept. It's a hard thing for anybody to accept. But what I think is interesting, Paul just in full ease and conscious authority finds himself in company with Sarah. He lines up with Sarah.

And you know what's cool about her? She knew she had the right, without permission from her husband or an apology to anyone, to demand the expulsion of Hagar. She knew she had that right. And Ishmael too. from the house. So Paul here shows that Hagar is what I would call an up-to-date woman. She's got it together. She understands. She understood, like Abraham should have understood, that the religion of nature or a system of observances or ordinances, either imposed or revived by a man or by men in the churches of believers, like the formality of days, or months, or times, or years, or rituals, or what seat you sit in.

All that goes to the spirit of bondage. All of it does. And it hinders the formation of Christ in your soul. It hinders the conformity to Christ because it forces you to look at yourself rather than the Lord Jesus. The Holy Spirit, who is the spirit of liberty, always presents Christ to the believer, not the rules. He always presents Christ.

The expulsion of Hagar, this bondwoman from the house of Abraham, Paul demands of the churches of the saints. He stresses with us full, unsparing decision as every Sarah demands, casting out Hagar, the Egyptian, and her mocking child. That's really what this is about. He's demanding and he's not suggesting it. He's saying to these people, look what you're going to miss if you don't do this.

So I read, I went back and read something in John chapter eight that kind of shows how the Holy Spirit brings liberty in and how we can understand it. Now, John chapter eight is a lot of that is taken up with the Lord Jesus in interaction with the Pharisees. And when the Pharisees brought the woman, taking in adultery to Him, and said, no, what are you going to do here? And so He starts, you know, doing this writing in the sand. But in those verses, in verse 32 of John chapter 8, here's what He says to the Pharisees.

You will know the truth and the truth will make you free. Great statement. And they said to Him, We are Abraham's descendants and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say you will become free? And Jesus says, truly I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin.

You guys aren't free. Why? They're under a legal system. They're under the Mosaic law. You don't get free under that system. The slave does not remain in the house forever, but the son does remain forever. So if the son makes you free, you will be free indeed. Not the law, the son. So freedom is attributed to the son, rather than the law, to the son of God acting by the truth. but points of view to a contradistinction to the law. It shows them if you're going to be free, you think you're free, but if you're really going to be free, it has to be about the Son and not the rules. All of chapter 8 is a really interesting chapter because the case of the woman taken in adultery, and she got caught in the very act of doing it. So there wasn't any question as to whether she was guilty. But here come these guys with her, And they are trying to use her for selfish purposes. And they were trying to demonstrate how religious they were.

Right? So what does the Lord Jesus do? He puts himself, as he might suppose, on God's side of that equation to judge the severest and plainest and most punitive guilt and this without mercy and without self-judgment. That's what they wanted him to do. And further, he would turn the case of man's sin and shame, and God's law, not only to the praise of himself, but he'd claim the righteousness which this man does not have, but it dishonors God's Son, what they want him to do.

So, it brought a lot of glory to Christ if you take a look at it carefully, for he never... Jesus didn't come to discredit the law, did he? He said, I came to fulfill it. But then there was a glory that surpassed the law, which was his. And it has come, the glory before which the dignity of the law grew pale. And Christ showed it most clearly.

Nevertheless, he proved, I'm sorry, not that he said one word to lower the law, which could not have been of God. He wouldn't do that because he wouldn't have been of God. But nevertheless, he proved the powerlessness of the law to meet the sinner's need. It didn't have within it the power to meet the sinner's need, except only in the way of destruction, which goes much further than those who cite it for an expecting change.

The law destroys the guilty person who wields it, it as well as against him as to whom it is aimed. In other words, the law not only is They aimed it at this woman taken in adultery, but it, you know, it's like somebody says, if I'm pointing at you, I've got three fingers pointing back at me. That's what the law does. It points back at you. And so you're going to be discredited, even though you're trying to discredit this person. Law destroys the guilty person.

It is the two edge in his character when Christ speaks, and those were forced to feel the zeal Most who applied it against the humiliated adulteress. They wanted the law, they wanted her stoned. Not she, but they, left in utter confusion from the presence of Christ. They all went away. Of Christ using, and he was using the law. You see how he used the law?

He said, you who are without sin, you pick up the first stone and fire it off her head. You who don't have any sin, you go ahead. We'll fulfill the law here. That's what you want, right? So in order for you to be qualified to do that, you must be free from sin yourself. And they weren't. And they knew it. And he was shown them in this sand exactly why they weren't. Even though they were zealous and they were trying to humiliate this woman. Nevertheless, he did most completely expose the irrationality and sin of their using the law. I hope that's clear to you.

That the Lord Jesus, even in that system, who came under the law and lived under the law, showed that by the law these people weren't qualified to carry out the execution. He showed that the one without sin could alone righteously throw the first stone. They were qualified. The law never did raise such a question that was never in the system. But Christ brings in a power and a comprehensiveness and a searching character which never had shown before, which can be seen not only in and through him.

The law implies, the law simply said thou shalt not do this but this is not he that is without sin. You understand that? The law said you can't do this, but it didn't say you who are without sin can do this. The law said don't do it. And if you do, I'm going to punish you. If you don't, I will bless you. But you can't carry out the punishment unless you're without sin, because none of them were.

So, like I said, Who was sinless in this situation? It was only the Lord Jesus. He was the only sinless one in that group. He alone had not come to condemn, he came to bless. The law might condemn, but there was none to execute it. He was the only one qualified.

For had a sentence been carried out, they were all dead men, all left equally under the penalty, though from different causes. they leave in hopeless confusion. And the woman was left in the presence of the Son, who shines with the Word of God, just as light shines from the Lord Jesus. And he says to her, where are your accusers? And she says, well, they've all left. And he said, well, I don't condemn you either. Go and don't sin anymore. Pretty cool. Pretty cool. So if you expand the translation here, It says, but what does the scripture say?

Throw out the maidservant and her son, for the son of the maidservant shall not by no means inherit the son of the free woman. The son of the maidservant is that person under law who isn't qualified to do anything and to inherit. But the son of the free woman is, using the allegory.

So, in verse 31 he says, so then brethren, We're not children of the bondwoman. We are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free woman. So what's it mean to be a child of the bondwoman? What does it mean to be the child of the free woman? Well, if you're a child of the free woman, well, by definition, you're not a child of a bondwoman. You're not under legalism. You are of the free woman. You can't be both. You have to be one or the other. And Paul says, If you live under law, then grace is no more grace. You can't live under grace and law at the same time. It's impossible to do.

We have been, and the whole point here, and the whole point to those Galatians is you're free from the law. Boy, is that a scary proposition. Now, when you go home today, don't exceed the speed limit, and if the cops stop, just say, hey, listen, I'm free from the law. We're not talking about that. We're talking about anything that has to do with being righteous before God.

You can't gain that by obeying the law. You're free from the ceremonies. You're free from the service to the law. You're free from, oh yeah, the elements of the world too. So, it's really interesting how living under grace is a scary thing for a lot of believers because we think, well, somebody has to tell me what to do. If I don't have the set of rules, how am I going to function? I won't be able to take care of my family. I won't be able to feed them and clothe them. And as a man, I won't be a good father because I won't have any rules to follow. How do you do that?

You discount, in our minds, we discount the Holy Spirit in our spirits, who operates not by legislative laws, but by spiritual principles. Why do you love God? Answer, because He first loved us. Why do I respond to Him? Because the grace overwhelms me.

I can't think of myself or see myself doing anything else. I live righteously because I already am righteous, not because I'm trying to get some. And we don't understand how grace is so powerful. Trisha McCauley said it's the most powerful thing in the world, is grace. If we would just rest in the fact that God's blessing and His grace towards us is the thing that would allow us to depend on the Spirit to function properly.

It would take you totally out of the legal realm. No. So we now belong to the risen Christ. We belong to Him. We are His property. He owns us. He bought us at the cross. He has totally wiped our sins out. He's also wiped out all the ordinances that have anything to do with the law. He bore the curse for us.

He has communicated to us a new life, a resurrected life, which that life itself lives in liberty. and holiness before God. That's who we are. Christ himself in this life, in it we rejoice. We rejoice in holiness as well as in forgiveness and in God himself instead of living in fear. We are children of the free woman and of her only, just her.

Now, with all of that in place, Paul now begins to exhort them on this faithful principle. These verses bring a climax to the argument that believers are not in a community or a nation of bondage under legal terms. He's made it perfectly plain that the believer in Jesus Christ is not under law. We are not children of the bondwoman.

We are children of the free woman, as Isaac of old was. We are what we are. Divine grace has made us. It's not a question of human effort at all. It's a question of, therefore, brethren, we are children, not of the bondwoman, but of the free woman. That's the real question. So, exhortation now will follow up based on what he's just laid out.

Galatians 5 chapter 1 says, it was for freedom that Christ set us free. Therefore, keep standing firm and don't be subjected again to the yoke of bondage. On the one hand, we cast out the bondwoman. We abandon the principle of seeking to attain and keep blessing under the law, which can only lead us back to bondage.

But on the other hand, we stand fast. We stay where we are. We stand in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. We don't move out of there. We do not go back and put the yoke of bondage on us again. We leave that alone. I'll give you an alternate translation that may help us understand this better.

For this above-mentioned freedom, Christ set us free. Keep on standing firm, therefore, and stop being held again by a yoke of bondage. So the word free, back in 431, is a translation of the same word as liberty. It's the same word. The teaching is that Christ died on the cross to give us the advantage of having this liberty or this freedom. He did that. And the liberty consists of the Christian's freedom from the law.

Under the law, you don't have any liberty. You have none because you're a slave to it. We went through the verses that talked about the law was a schoolmaster to lead us to Christ. Under the law, we don't have any freedom. Somebody else is determining what goes on with us. person that accompanies us under a law system as a drill instructor at Parris Island.

You don't do anything of your own. You do only what he tells you to do. And you might, because you're a little nervy, one time step out of line. Trust me, you pay for it big time. A child doesn't have any freedom of action. He doesn't have any self-determination. He's got to move within a set of of prescribed rules that the guardian puts on him. He's not old enough yet to act alone on his own. So, believers that are stuck in legal churches, I look at them that way. Well, none of those people are old enough to act on their own. They wouldn't like that. Always under the restrictions of a guardian. So, with the person under the law.

But we, to repeat, we are free. We're free from the law. We've been placed in the family of God and we are adult sons. Adult sons. We're indwelt by the Holy Spirit who would enable us then to act out in our experience the maturity of a Christian life in which we've been placed. No more straitjacket. No more cramping experiences. No more stultifying actions, no more depraving ourselves of the power of the Holy Spirit. The Galatians were like adult children putting themselves under the rules made for children. That's really what they were doing.

So, the liberty spoken of here doesn't refer to the kind of life a person lives, nor does it refer to his words or his actions. But it does talk about the method by which he lives this life. He'll live it by faith under grace. The Judaizers lived their lives by dependence on self-effort and attempt to obey a law.

The Galatians, Christians, had been living their lives in dependence upon the Holy Spirit. Their hearts had been occupied with Christ. the details of their lives being guided by the principles that emerged from the teaching of the apostles, both the doctrine and practice, they started to swing back. They were losing their freedom. Their flexibility was going away. Their self-determination was going away. They were doing what they thought was right under a lost system. We function not because a law says forbids it or commends it to be right, but we function because it pleases the Lord Jesus Christ. That's why we do it. And because we love Him, because He first loved us. So Paul says to them, keep standing fast in that freedom, freedom from the law and freedom to abide in Christ. and don't move out from there. Just stay there. Don't get entangled again. Don't get ensnared again. Just stay where you are.

Don't you find it interesting that under grace, it's always, I've done this, so just stay where you are. I was thinking as we were driving the other day, stay in your lane, bro. What's my lane? My lane is in Christ, resting under His grace, with the Spirit of God enthralling me, and I can function eternally and never have to change. That's the way it goes. So let's pray. Father, how we thank You. How we thank You that You have set us free in Christ and that we can just stand firm and just relax and trust Him to live his life out through us. And we pray in your son's precious name. Amen.