Guest speaker Rev. Jeff Walsh
Many of us enjoy sharing details of our ancestry, connecting ourselves to some famous names in history. For the Jews, ancestry was extremely important (just consider the number of genealogies listed in Scripture), and many in Bible times could recite their lineage back to Abraham and beyond.
Two Sons
The Apostle Paul had already mentioned Abraham in this letter to the Galatian believers in chapter 3, where he made the point that justification is by faith and not by keeping the Old Testament law. He concluded in 3:29, “And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.” Now he expands on that by contrasting Abraham’s first two sons. (Abraham had other children after Sarah died.)
Ishmael was born through Abraham’s slave Hagar (Genesis 16). Abraham and Sarah had heard God’s promise of offspring, but after waiting years for that to happen, they took things into their own hands to use Hagar as a kind of surrogate as was common in that culture. This human reasoning is what is meant by Paul’s words “born according to the flesh” (v. 23). They had been unwilling to wait for God’s timing to provide Isaac, the son “born through promise.” Isaac was born through supernatural means since Sarah was past childbearing age.
Paul then goes on to link Ishmael and Hagar to the old covenant of the law (v. 24), which was the foundation of Judaism. The Jewish faith was centered around the city of Jerusalem as the location of the God’s Temple and the place where all the sacrifices were to be made. Isaac, however, pointed ahead to the new covenant made possible by Jesus’s death on the cross and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. This covenant of faith is ultimately fulfilled in the New Jerusalem in the new heavens and new earth (Rev. 21:2).
In verse 27 Paul quotes from Isaiah 54, reinforcing the fact that it is the children of faith that belong to God, not children of biology. The promise of a multitude of offspring to Abraham was not about begetting biological children, but being adopted into that family line through faith in Jesus Christ. The barren woman, Sarah, thus had more children through faith than Hagar had through childbirth. (Similarly, the Apostle Paul had spiritual children even though he was never married.)
Slaves or Sons
It comes down to us in verses 28-31. If we are true believers, we are children of the promise like Isaac was. We can claim Abraham as our ancestor because God is our true Father. But if we try to return to following the law to earn God’s favor, we are living as if we’re slaves, not sons. This is what was happening in Galatia, and often happens in the modern-day Church as well. We tend to gravitate toward self-made religion, which always enslaves us. Jesus plus anything else is not the true gospel. (See last week’s sermon recap for some ways in which we add to the gospel.) The true gospel is that salvation is by faith in Jesus Christ alone.
Warnings
Persecution will come to those born of the Spirit. Just as Ishmael expressed animosity toward Isaac, the world will hate us too (Matt. 5:11). And not only the world outside the Church, but our “half-brothers” inside the Church, those sincere but false believers who insist on adding their own ideas to the gospel. In 2 Corinthians 11:13-15 Paul wrote,
“For such men are false apostles, deceitful workmen, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. So it is no surprise if his servants, also, disguise themselves as servants of righteousness. Their end will correspond to their deeds.”
The Church must be vigilant about holding fast to the truth of Scripture and making sure that all teaching is in accordance with Scripture. Most false teachers don’t know they are distorting the Word—they think they are correct. That’s why is it important for believers to be regularly in their Bibles, “examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things [are] so” (Acts 17:11).
If we find false gospels in our own lives or in our church, we are to cast them out (v. 30). This doesn’t mean locking the doors to keep out every difference of opinion. There are some grey areas where disagreement is not a major issue, such as our view of the end times, our mode of baptism, and other denominational distinctives. But if teachers persist in proclaiming something that is contrary to salvation by faith alone in Christ alone, they need to be removed from the fellowship because they are false teachers.
Our Charge
“There’s opportunity for each of us to be workers for the gospel in our local churches and to show how much greater it is than the false gospels being offered. Let’s seek that work first, and humbly fall to our knees in grief-stricken prayer for the lost and the false teacher. People on the internet and people in our local churches are suffering without God—and will for all eternity if they don’t believe the gospel. We need to be bearers of the good news to them, not jesters poking fun at their foolishness.
“Let’s be propelled by the same desire as C. H. Spurgeon for the lost: ‘If sinners be damned, at least let them leap to Hell over our dead bodies. And if they perish, let them perish with our arms wrapped about their knees, imploring them to stay. If Hell must be filled, let it be filled in the teeth of our exertions, and let not one go unwarned and unprayed for.’ Let this be our attitude as we rebuke false teaching.”
An Added Explanation
Some might ask, where do things like church attendance and Bible reading fit in if all that is required for salvation is faith in Christ? The “spiritual disciplines” or “means of grace” of church membership, prayer, Bible study, fasting, etc., cannot save us in and of themselves. They are not for salvation but for sanctification—growing in our faith and walking with God day by day. We might skip out on those things, but if we do we will always be weak and immature Christians. One who has come to faith in Christ has received the Holy Spirit and a new heart, and therefore should have a desire to be growing and changing. If they don’t have that desire or have resisted the opportunities they have to grow, it is questionable whether they truly are a believer. Salvation is not just a “get out of hell free” card, but being adopted into God’s family. If God is truly your Father, you can’t simply ignore everything He said in the Bible about how we are to walk by the Spirit and how to relate to one another in the Church. We’ll get into this more in Galatians 5 and 6.
“For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery” (5:1).
Discussion Questions
1) Are you living as a child of the promise through faith in Jesus Christ, or as a slave of some self-made religion?
2) What kinds of things are we most likely to add to the gospel or substitute for the gospel? Behavior? Christian heritage? Religious activity?
3) How have you experienced living in freedom in Christ? How has it given you greater joy, peace, gratitude, or boldness?
4) What forms of persecution have you seen either personally or in our culture for living by faith in Christ alone?
5) Do you feel confident that you can share the true gospel without adding anything to it?
