Word of Salvation – Vol. 14 No.04 – January 1968

 

Slavery And God’s Time Of Deliverance

 

Sermon by Rev. J. VanderReest on Gal.4:3-5

Scripture Reading: Gal.3:23 – 4:7

Psalter Hymnal: 201; 398:1,3,5; 346; 350; 339:1,2

 

Dear friends,

The history of the world has intrigued many people throughout the ages, and it still has the interest of many people today.  History is seen as an important subject at school and every teenager has to learn some aspects of our past.

Many clever men, such as philosophers and theologians have tried to find some principle to explain history, for it is an accepted fact that history is not just a succession of freak accidents or events without any further meaning.

There is development and growth in history.  We could compare it with a young child that grows up, matures and grows old.  Or the development could be compared with a cup that is filled and that becomes full to the brim.  But the most important question is: Who controls history?

The Christian knows that it is God who controls and governs the world.  It is the Almighty Creator who governs the development of time and history.

And in our letter to the Galatians we find that Paul stresses this point that God governs the times and histories of nations.  The apostle Paul stresses that God directs all things for the wellbeing of man.

In our text we see that:

Once we lived in Slavery, but at God’s time we were delivered.
And we see   1.  The time of bondage.
                        2.  God’s decision.
                        3.  Our redemption and adoption.

1.  The time of bondage.

The people of the Old dispensation are in our text compared with children.

This is not because they were inferior to us, or anything less than what we are in the sight of God.  No, in O.T. times the people of God had to live according to the laws given to Moses at Sinai; and this stage is compared by Paul as the stage of a child, a minor kept under guardianship.  The people of Israel were kept under the guardianship of the Law of Moses.  They had to keep all the stipulations and regulations laid down in the law; for this was the way God had ordained for His people.  God had made the people of Israel His special people and therefore they had to keep the obligations of the covenant the Lord had made with them.

And these obligations were many and burdensome.  Peter even speaks of: “a yoke which neither we nor our fathers were able to bear”.  It was very exacting and demanded many duties, minutely described.  There were directions as to worship, labour, dress, food, birth, marriage, war, trade, tax or tithe.

And when they transgressed the law they had to offer a sacrifice, a bullock for a sin offering, for atonement.  But the law was not only burdensome, we even have to go a step further.  Paul also says that the O.T.people were in bondage under the elements of the world.  Or as the R.S.V. states it: (they) were slaves to the elemental spirits of the universe.  Paul means to say with this that the people of the O.T. times were still in an elementary stage.  We would say they were still in the state of learning the A.B.C.  They had to serve with outward things and with Levitical ceremonies.  They slavishly had to do all the works of the law!

As we read in Lev.18:5 – You shall therefore keep my statutes and my ordinances, (for) by doing them a man shall live…!  Men had to do this and do that; perform certain rites; he was to keep himself righteous by fulfilling all the commandments.

Paul calls this O.T. period, a period of bondage, of slavery.

He compares it with the situation of a slave.

And that was not only the case with Israel, but with the whole world of those days.  In fact Israel was privileged above the other nations.  Israel possessed a revelation from God, the law and later the prophets.  But the rest of the world lived in darkness, was wandering without light and without a shepherd.

It was wandering from pillar to post, from one idol to another, and to the next.  They were kept in bondage, in slavery to their man-made gods.  Spiritually the O.T. world lived like a child, like a slave; without the fuller revelation as we have it today.

For what did they know about Jesus Christ, about salvation and the life we may have with Him after death?

No, spiritually it was a dark world indeed.

2.  God’s decision.

But then comes God’s decision.

A decision in time.  A great event!

A decision which makes a great contrast with what preceded.  God decided to make it Christmas.  For God decided that man was to be delivered of his bondage from his slavery to the elements of this world.  Man was to be saved and redeemed.

God decided that ‘the fullness of time’ was there, that man was to be redeemed from the yoke of the law.

We could go into a long and deep speculation of what we should understand by this fullness of time, or why it was the fullness of time.  But we really don’t know; the Holy Scriptures do not reveal it to us.  But one thing is sure that it was God, who decided that it was the right time for sending Christ Jesus, His Son and that many things worked together for the good of Christ’s coming.  And it is sure that God had prepared for the coming of His Son.

The most important point however, is that God decided that the time for Christmas had come.  God had seen the bondage and slavery of His people under the law.  God had seen that His people could not make themselves righteous, nor could earn their salvation by keeping the law.  God saw that they were no longer able to bear the yoke and oppression of the law.

Therefore God made it Christmas in the fullness of time.

I think we often forget that Christmas was made by God.  No, I don’t mean the Christmas we celebrate nowadays, with Christmas cake, Christmas pudding, Christmas cards and Christmas parties.  That is a commercialized Christmas, a Christmas according to the calendar, not a Christmas made by God in the fullness of time.  Christmas was a decision by God; a divine decision.  God decided to send God – His Son – to become man, in order to redeem man.

And that is what happened, in the fullness of time, God sent forth His Son.

Oh, it was not a very great event in the eyes of the world.  He was born in a very humble dwelling, a smelly stable; not in a palace like a royal king.  This could have been the case, for He was God Himself, the Divine One, the pre-existent One; and no honour would have been too great to bestow it on Him.

But He did not receive honour and glory.  Right from His birth onward He did not receive anything else but humiliation and dishonour.

Even the fact that He was become – born – of a woman, a virgin, is part of His humiliation.  He was made to be under the law; that means that despite the fact that He was sinless, He had to fulfil the obligations of the law, like all the people of the old dispensation had to do.  He had to keep all the ceremonies and stipulations of the Mosaic laws.

Jesus Christ, the Son of God had to subject Himself to the yoke of the law and had to fulfil every jot and tittle of the law.  He had to be obedient to the law in order to win our deliverance from the law.  Man was weak and sinful and was unable to bear the yoke of the law, unable to fulfil the obligations of the covenant God had made with man.  And God’s Son, who was above the law, subjected Himself to the law, so that God’s people were freed from the law.

Don’t we often forget this?
We always think of Christmas as a happy event – and so it is!
It is the greatest Event the earth has ever witnessed.

But that does not mean that we should forget about the implications that went along with this great event.  It was the greatest humiliation that God’s Son, Himself very God, was reckoned among sinners.  In order to redeem man He had to be humiliated, had to suffer and die on the Cross.

God’s Son left the splendour of His heavenly dwelling place, became man and suffered the agonies of hell.

All this was included in God’s decision that the fullness of time had come.  All this was included in the decision of God to send His Son.

All this, humiliation, suffering and death is included in Christmas.  No, not the things made of tinsel, paper and coloured lights, add up to make Christmas, not even food and drink, although people seem to spend millions on these things.

No, it is the event of Christ’s birth, His humiliation, His suffering and death that makes Christmas.  It is the event of the Incarnation, the event of God with us.

Yes, it is the event which gives us great joy, joy for the greatness of God’s love which he has bestowed upon us.

But at the same time it gives us also great sorrow.  At least it should!  Sorrow, that men (you and me) had fallen so deep; were enslaved in sin that much that God’s love had to go as far as sending His Son to be born of a woman, to be humiliated, to suffer and die, to deliver us from our sins.

God’s love had to go so far, that in Christ our sins were nailed to the Cross (Col.2:14), God offered up His Son for our deliverance.

Brothers and sisters, let us not forget this; let us not forget.  it when we are happy, when we sing our Christmas carols and enjoy each other’s fellowship.

Christmas is not just a sentimental song about a lonely couple and a little baby-boy in a manger.

It is much more!  Christmas also meant suffering and death!  You haven’t understood Christmas as yet, if you do not see behind the stable and the Star of Bethlehem, the silhouette of the Cross of Golgotha – also that was included in God’s decision, in the fullness of time.

When we look back to the O.T. dispensation and compare it with the time after God had made His decision – we see a great contrast.

Before Christ came, the O.T. people were like fishermen, eagerly awaiting the early hours of dawn, which will bring light and happiness.

They were like people walking in the early hours before sunrise; eagerly looking for a faint light rising on the horizon; the promise of sunlight to come.

There was an expectation for the time that the light would fully shine, they eagerly awaited that day; like a child longs for the day that it will be an adult, eager to be free and able to make its own decisions.

And that eagerly awaited day came.

It came with Christmas, nearly two thousand years ago.  Then came the Light; the Great Light descended from Heaven and with it came:

3.  Our redemption and adoption.

For God had a purpose with His decision to send His Son.  It was in order to redeem those that were under the law and those that walked in darkness.

God decided that it was time to take away the yoke and to redeem the people from the slavery to the elements of this world.

Christ came and delivered His people.

Christ came and subjected Himself to the law that we might receive the adoption of sons.  Through Christ we are accepted as God’s children; through Christ we are adopted, adopted as heirs, Christ our Deliverer and Advocate.

What does that mean: being adopted?

We often think of adoption as something that will never become fully your own.  But that was not the Jewish idea of adoption.  When a boy was adopted by a Jewish father, he became the son of the father, with all the privileges and with the full rights of being his son.  That meant also that he became an heir, a possessor of the father’s property after his death – just like a real son, without any difference.

That is the reason why the idea of adoption plays such an important role in the N.T.  The children of God are seen as real children of the Father, adopted through Jesus Christ.  And they are therefore also heirs, heirs – possessors – of salvation.

And Paul says the purpose of Christmas was: “that we might receive adoption as sons”.  Jesus Christ came down to earth, so that you could be adopted, could become a real child of God.

Can you understand this?
Can you understand this great wonder?
It is not because of ourselves!
It is not because we are so good!
It is pure grace.
It is wholly the work of God.

Yes, it is a privilege to be called a son, child of God.  And privileges also bring responsibilities.  Christmas brings responsibilities.  Christmas is not just something you can turn on and off when you want to.  It is not like a record, when you have had enough of it then you stop the music.

No Christmas involves responsibility, a duty, namely to live as sons of God.  You and I – we have the duty to live up to our adoption.

When you begin to see the greatness of God’s love in Christmas, then you begin to live as an adult, bearing the responsibilities of faith and living a life with only Christ as your Example.

Then you begin to understand the great light of Christmas and do you become conscious of the great darkness around you.

God’s decision for our deliverance fell in the fullness of time.  But once more God will decide, again in the fullness of time.  When the cup will be filled to the brim with the tears of the saints, crying for their deliverance in body and soul.  Once more God will decide, when the souls under the altar have cried enough saying: “How, long, O sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before thou wilt judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell upon the earth?”

Then the fullness of time has come for the second and last time; then at the second Coming of Christ, God will decide; decide who were for or against Him.  Then He will judge and it will appear who have seen Christmas and who have believed and accepted.

Are you going to Bethlehem, are you going to your King, who came as a child?  Are you going to move closer to God, serve and adore Him, to-day and every day – Him  who came to save sinners?  And also you, children, He wants you to come.  He loves children and He wants you to sing of His birth and His great love for you.

But let us all go, each one of us.  No, for this you do not have to travel to Palestine; right in your home today you may adore Him, praise Him, love Him and glorify Him; to-day and for evermore.

God decided and delivered us from bondage.
God came and it became Christmas.
God loved and Christ died.
God made it Christmas!

Amen.