SPEAKER_00: Good morning.
SPEAKER_00: Today, uh, Pastor Brian is going to be reading and preaching from Galatians.
SPEAKER_00: Galatians 4, if you guys would like to follow along.
SPEAKER_00: We have a short passage today, but it is profound.
SPEAKER_00: Galatians 4, 4 through 7.
SPEAKER_00: But when the fullness of time came, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, so that he might redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.
SPEAKER_00: Because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father, therefore you are no longer a slave, but a son.
SPEAKER_00: And if a son, then an heir through God.
SPEAKER_00: This is the word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: So good to know these truths, isn't it?
SPEAKER_01: What a joy.
SPEAKER_01: Let's go to the Lord one more time in prayer as we dive in to his word.
SPEAKER_01: Father, we thank you for the privilege, gift it is to be here.
SPEAKER_01: I thank you, Father, for your word to us again.
SPEAKER_01: But ultimately, we thank you for your Son Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: We thank you for the humiliation of taking on human flesh.
SPEAKER_01: We thank you for the humiliation of being subject and submitting to death, even death on a cross.
SPEAKER_01: Father, we thank you that we have hope.
SPEAKER_01: That we have the gift of hope.
SPEAKER_01: Remind us of this day by day, Father, as we look to Christ, especially as Christmas approaches and we look to the manger scene, Father, help us to remember the beauty and the truth behind that.
SPEAKER_01: The eternal mystery revealed in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Lead us and guide us.
SPEAKER_01: For your glory, we pray in Christ's name.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Well, as we dive into the book of Galatians in this passage here, I want to ask you a question that you know the answer to.
SPEAKER_01: What is hope?
SPEAKER_01: If you look at the definitions listed out in most modern dictionaries, you get something like this.
SPEAKER_01: Hope is a feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen.
SPEAKER_01: This definition is a good one if we're thinking in terms of human hope, right?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, think about, for example, the the child sitting in the windowsill in their home as early evening approaches, staring out the window.
SPEAKER_01: You know where I'm going with this.
SPEAKER_01: For a glimpse of dad's car to come around the corner as he arrives home from work.
SPEAKER_01: There is a hope in this kid that his dad's gonna be home soon.
SPEAKER_01: There's the hope for the unemployed person that applies for a job hoping they're gonna get it.
SPEAKER_01: He sits by the phone, waits for a call, or I guess maybe in our day and age he waits for that very professional text message to come across to indicate whether or not he got the job.
SPEAKER_01: We hope that our car is gonna make it over the pass when the snow flies.
SPEAKER_01: We hope that our roof shingles will hold out in the rain.
SPEAKER_01: We hope that we don't get the flu this time of year.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe we hope that we're gonna make the team.
SPEAKER_01: Some of us may hope that the snow flies in the form of an absolute blizzard when that certain family member approach or family time approaches.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe not.
SPEAKER_01: But as Christians, we we hope and we pray that we're gonna have an opportunity to share Christ with our loved ones in those times, right?
SPEAKER_01: And we hope that we're gonna stay faithful as a church in both our witness and our doctrine, no matter what winds of change come to us socially or politically in our country.
SPEAKER_01: Point is, is we're almost, I mean, we could go down the list, right?
SPEAKER_01: We're almost constantly hoping for something in this life.
SPEAKER_01: We may not always use the word when thinking this way, but we hope a lot.
SPEAKER_01: Which is good much of the time.
SPEAKER_01: Most of what I listed out aren't bad things to hope for.
SPEAKER_01: But is that the kind of hope we primarily see in the Bible?
SPEAKER_01: Is that what we see?
SPEAKER_01: Somewhat.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we see that here and there.
SPEAKER_01: But I would say the primary use of hope in the scriptures, the distinctive use, the important use, is different than those common and accepted definitions that our culture uses.
SPEAKER_01: The biblical definition of hope for the most part simply centers around a person.
SPEAKER_01: The biblical definition of hope may sound something like this, very short.
SPEAKER_01: It is a confident expectation of things to come.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, it's a desire, as the previous definition proposes, but it is a desire that is linked to confidence, confident expectation.
SPEAKER_01: Not just wishing without the guarantee part.
SPEAKER_01: It's certainty, certainty of mind that is a joy.
SPEAKER_01: One example of hope that we have in the scriptures is the return of our Savior Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: He's coming.
SPEAKER_01: There's no doubt.
SPEAKER_01: And he will come at precisely the perfect timing, and it will be absolutely glorious.
SPEAKER_01: That's one example.
SPEAKER_01: And so, as we study today one of the gifts of Christmas in this season, I never want us to forget the great expectancy that we cling to in Christ as we think of this ultimate gift.
SPEAKER_01: And so, without on your minds, as we dive into this passage in Galatians, we're going to look at it in two parts to see the hope.
SPEAKER_01: And one, we're going to look at the foundation of our hope in a few parts.
SPEAKER_01: And then, second, we're going to look at the certainty of our hope.
SPEAKER_01: So the foundation and the certainty.
SPEAKER_01: So let's first look at the foundation of our hope.
SPEAKER_01: Or the background, if you will.
SPEAKER_01: To begin, uh to look into this, I think it's important for us to just get a little snippet of what the context is as Paul is writing this, as he says, to the churches in Galatia.
SPEAKER_01: Right off the bat in this book, Paul begins by addressing and really calling out those who have begun to receive a false gospel in those churches.
SPEAKER_01: Paul rebukes them for this and says, hey guys, if any other gospel comes your way, I don't care if an angel is proclaiming it.
SPEAKER_01: If there's any other gospel from the one that I told you, it is a curse upon your eternal soul if you receive that and follow that.
SPEAKER_01: Any other one but the one of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Again, in the beginning of the chapter three, right after he speaks those famous words at the end of chapter two.
SPEAKER_01: Remember those famous words that we should all try to memorize, where he says, I have been crucified with Christ.
SPEAKER_01: It is no longer I who live, Christ who lives in me.
SPEAKER_01: And he goes on from there.
SPEAKER_01: Right after that, in chapter three, Paul says, You foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you?
SPEAKER_01: Paul becomes stunned by their lack of faith in the gospel if they have reverted back to clinging to the works of the flesh to save themselves.
SPEAKER_01: So then he spends the rest of the third chapter and even into the fourth, just explaining that while the law is good and in that it was meant to show us what holy living looks like and it's necessary, it's yet a curse to us because we cannot follow and fulfill it.
SPEAKER_01: We needed somebody to do that on our behalf.
SPEAKER_01: We needed Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: We needed Jesus, the Son of God, to come.
SPEAKER_01: And he goes even a little further here early on in the beginning of the fourth chapter by saying that we tend to follow after that which is elemental, that which is of the world or worldly systems, those basic things.
SPEAKER_01: To the Jews, that meant they followed the traditions of men over and above the Word of God, or created their own version, which of course made them slaves to the world, as we looked at from Titus III last time.
SPEAKER_01: But they were slaves to elemental things, Paul is saying.
SPEAKER_01: They were seeking to follow the law by their own efforts, for their own gain, not out of an attitude of just faithful obedience, because of who God is and what he's accomplished.
SPEAKER_01: No, they were nursing, if you will, on the elementary things of the world, and in doing so, just forsaking the law and what the law pointed to.
SPEAKER_01: For the Gentile, Paul is relating these elemental weak and worthless things of their pagan worship.
SPEAKER_01: In verse 9, Paul uses the same word to describe their elementary understandings of the divine and wants them to see the beauty of looking into the deep things of God instead.
SPEAKER_01: Either way, both Jew and Gentile are acting as children, he's saying.
SPEAKER_01: Slaves to those elementary things, those insignificant things.
SPEAKER_01: And Paul is just trying to lead them away from that, lead them to the truth, to heavenly things.
SPEAKER_01: He's fervently trying to teach them and remind them of the real and eternally good news.
SPEAKER_01: The gospel of Jesus Christ, the only gospel.
SPEAKER_01: And how does he do that?
SPEAKER_01: How does he get to that point?
SPEAKER_01: Well, now we enter into the foundation of our hope.
SPEAKER_01: Enter into the foundation of our inheritance as children of God.
SPEAKER_01: Look again at verse 4.
SPEAKER_01: As we break down this verse, as we see this incredible gift of hope, I want us to see it in four parts.
SPEAKER_01: But when the fullness of time came, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law.
SPEAKER_01: First Paul says, when the fullness of time came, what does he mean by that?
SPEAKER_01: Well, I think Mark 1.15 helps us when it says, the time is fulfilled, the kingdom of God is at hand.
SPEAKER_01: Repent and believe in the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: That's it.
SPEAKER_01: The time is fulfilled.
SPEAKER_01: It is now time to look to Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Here's your Messiah.
SPEAKER_01: When Jesus came, it revealed to all of creation that the time of God is fulfilled for this event.
SPEAKER_01: His perfect timing has now come to pass for this majestic event to take place.
SPEAKER_01: And what event was that?
SPEAKER_01: Christmas.
SPEAKER_01: The word became flesh, John tells us.
SPEAKER_01: That the incarnate Son of God would come down to us.
SPEAKER_01: God's precise and perfect timing is now in that sense.
SPEAKER_01: It happened.
SPEAKER_01: It was right according to his divine will.
SPEAKER_01: And in God's sovereign providence, we see some neat things in that regard.
SPEAKER_01: Even some earthly, if you will, or temporary reasons as to part of the timing.
SPEAKER_01: You've got to remember at that time, because of the great influence of the Greeks, there was for really a first time a common language known by most in the modern area.
SPEAKER_01: This is going to be important because if you have a common language, what do you get to proclaim?
SPEAKER_01: The news of Jesus Christ and the Christ child in the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: Another significant factor was the Roman infrastructure that came.
SPEAKER_01: Rome, who had taken over after the Greeks and who were present at the time of Christ when he came as conquering empire, they had created this vast road system complete with highways, if you will, not like ours.
SPEAKER_01: Highways for the transportation of soldiers, goods, other things.
SPEAKER_01: And one of those things that would be taken on the road was what?
SPEAKER_01: Good news of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: There's so many political, social, economic, and even religious reasons that we can now look back through history that are all possibly a part of the fullness of time as we look with our limited scope and knowledge.
SPEAKER_01: But ultimately, again, it is God's prerogative in his perfect timing that this was to be accomplished.
SPEAKER_01: And so for thousands of years, as we read the Old Testament, the prophets had foretold of this one who was coming.
SPEAKER_01: This one who would come and rescue and redeem and ransom a people for himself.
SPEAKER_01: That's the point of the Old Testament, ultimately, is look to Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Whether that's specific prophecies, like some in Psalm 22 or Isaiah 53, for example, that speak of Christ, or maybe it's types of Christ, as we understand Moses, Joseph, Isaac, even the Israelite people, they're all types of Christ in a sense.
SPEAKER_01: And that's another study for another time.
SPEAKER_01: But the point is it all points to his coming, his life, his death, his resurrection, his kingdom.
SPEAKER_01: And since it is pointing to this central figure, Paul says, the time has come.
SPEAKER_01: The time was fulfilled.
SPEAKER_01: It was the right time, the ripe time, according to the Father's will.
SPEAKER_01: This is yet another one of those beautiful times in Scripture where we see, in a sense, but God.
SPEAKER_01: We talked about that last time too.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't use those two words here specifically, but that's what Paul's getting at.
SPEAKER_01: You see, as they were focusing on elementary things, he says, the fullness of time came.
SPEAKER_01: You're over here, and the fullness of time came for you, for you to know and believe.
SPEAKER_01: Remember, it wasn't that long after that Paul wrote this.
SPEAKER_01: And so what we find is Paul says this is he's not just saying, hey, that happened, and just moving on.
SPEAKER_01: He's saying, hope came just at the right time.
SPEAKER_01: Perfectly.
SPEAKER_01: So just a quick point of application, I think, is important.
SPEAKER_01: Brothers and sisters, no matter what's going on in your life right now, everything God does is just at the right time.
SPEAKER_01: You may not like it.
SPEAKER_01: It may be a tough season.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe it's the best season in your life you've ever had.
SPEAKER_01: Either way.
SPEAKER_01: It's always at the right time.
SPEAKER_01: In his way.
SPEAKER_01: Especially in the sending of his son.
SPEAKER_01: Nothing is accidental in God's economy.
SPEAKER_01: Nothing is coincidental.
SPEAKER_01: Nothing is outside of his sovereign will and decree.
SPEAKER_01: Brothers and sisters, we praise God for that.
SPEAKER_01: Could you imagine the chaos that would ensue if God wasn't sovereign over everything?
SPEAKER_01: Just the right time, he came.
SPEAKER_01: Leads us to the second part of this incredible gift of our foundational hope.
SPEAKER_01: So it says, but when the fullness of time came, what happened?
SPEAKER_01: God sent forth his son.
unknown: Wow.
SPEAKER_01: You ever just marvel and reflect on that for a moment?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, we say that all the time throughout the year, especially at Christmas.
SPEAKER_01: God sent his son.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: Do you ever just reflect on that?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, that is wonderful, essential, and really mind-boggling, isn't it?
SPEAKER_01: Ultimately, I would say what this statement does, what Paul is doing, is declaring Jesus' divinity in one way.
SPEAKER_01: Because the fact that God sent forth his son does two things for us.
SPEAKER_01: It declares Jesus' eternality as God, and at the same time, it assures us that there is such a thing as hope, real hope.
SPEAKER_01: Again, if Jesus isn't God, our sins are not forgiven.
SPEAKER_01: He would never have been able to endure the temptations nor the cross.
SPEAKER_01: His eternality, therefore, is supremely important.
SPEAKER_01: It tells us he's God.
SPEAKER_01: Think about it.
SPEAKER_01: It says here he was sent by the Father.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't say created, does it?
SPEAKER_01: It says sent forth, not just born.
SPEAKER_01: We'll talk about his birth in a moment, but before we do that, we need to know and understand Jesus is divine.
SPEAKER_01: He is God who came in the flesh, not just a creation of the Father.
SPEAKER_01: John 1.1 tells us that in the beginning he was with God and he was God.
SPEAKER_01: Many false religions will try to tell you that Jesus is the first and greatest created being.
SPEAKER_01: That's not true.
SPEAKER_01: It sounds nice to us because we can grasp that a little bit better in our small minds.
SPEAKER_01: But actually, what is true is just far superior to that.
SPEAKER_01: And actually makes sense.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus is literally God who came in the flesh.
SPEAKER_01: He has always existed as God and will always exist as God.
SPEAKER_01: The point is that Jesus is God.
SPEAKER_01: God sent forth his son.
SPEAKER_01: God sent forth the other member of the Trinity, one of the other.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus is God in essence, nature, substance, power.
SPEAKER_01: Therefore, in the incarnation, we see that he willingly submitted to the Father in that glorious role of Son, the one who receives the inheritance, namely his church.
SPEAKER_01: And at no time on earth did Jesus ever give up one ounce of his divine nature.
SPEAKER_01: Not one.
SPEAKER_01: He was God, is God, and will always be God.
SPEAKER_01: And what this means ultimately for us is now we can have hope.
SPEAKER_01: Because of this, because of Jesus coming.
SPEAKER_01: There is immense hope in this because we see that our triune God chose to bless us with his presence, and through the incarnation, the result ends up being salvation for lost and wayward sinners such as myself.
SPEAKER_01: God came down.
SPEAKER_01: Ah, brothers and sisters, is Christmas a time.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, truly a time to reflect on hope.
SPEAKER_01: Think about that again.
SPEAKER_01: The eternal Son of God was sent to save.
SPEAKER_01: Not just sit on a royal chamber and rule, but to die and to save sinners.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, so we've established that he is God who came forth, was sent forth.
SPEAKER_01: Now, let's look at this third portion of the foundational hope.
SPEAKER_01: He is born of a woman.
SPEAKER_01: Again, verse 4.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, so I've already said it's essential that Jesus is God, that it takes a divine nature to be able to save us.
SPEAKER_01: Well, on the flip side of the coin, it also requires him being human to do this.
SPEAKER_01: He had to be born of a woman.
SPEAKER_01: Notice it doesn't say born of Adam, born of man.
SPEAKER_01: He could not be Adam's seed.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, he came to be the better and truer Adam, Paul tells us.
SPEAKER_01: So he had to be born of a virgin, conceived by the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: That's essential to Christmas, isn't it?
SPEAKER_01: And in this way, he came to save us and destroy the works of the devil, the Bible says.
SPEAKER_01: Really, there's no other reason for Jesus to take on human flesh than to save humans and glorify the Father.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't do anything to further his deity, as we talked about this morning in Sunday school.
SPEAKER_01: It only adds pain, toil, suffering, hunger, thirst, sorrow.
SPEAKER_01: It didn't benefit him in that way.
SPEAKER_01: The only additions that came with the human flesh was now he's a sin bearer, along with decay.
SPEAKER_01: That's the only additions.
SPEAKER_01: The only benefit is he came to glorify the Father and save the people.
SPEAKER_01: I want you to listen to what a great Puritan Stephen Charnock said about this when he speaks of the two natures of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And I know we're getting deep, but this is really important for us to understand Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: Christ had two natures.
SPEAKER_01: He says this what a wonder that two natures infinitely distant should be more intimately united than anything in the world.
SPEAKER_01: That the same person should have both a glory and a grief, an infinite joy in the deity, and an inexpressible sorrow in the humanity.
SPEAKER_01: That a god upon a throne should be an infant in a cradle.
SPEAKER_01: The thundering creator be a weeping babe and a suffering man.
SPEAKER_01: The incarnation astonishes men upon the earth and angels in heaven.
SPEAKER_01: End quote.
SPEAKER_01: It should boggle our minds.
SPEAKER_01: The fact that Jesus is born of the woman is really one of the essentials of our faith.
SPEAKER_01: If that's not true, we don't have faith.
SPEAKER_01: Our faith is in nothing.
SPEAKER_01: Not just because he came down, but how he condescended to us.
SPEAKER_01: He chose to be born of a woman because this is how we are saved.
SPEAKER_01: Christmas is so wonderful for so many reasons.
SPEAKER_01: But to think that Jesus came and voluntarily became born of a woman produces just universe-altering truth and hope for us.
SPEAKER_01: Because once we realize that if he wasn't human, Jesus could no longer or could never know nor experience all the temptations and frailties humanity has.
SPEAKER_01: God could never be tempted to sin.
SPEAKER_01: He's perfectly holy.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus therefore had to be human so that he could know all of what it means to be human by experience, even to know the sting of death for a time.
SPEAKER_01: And that's God's plan.
SPEAKER_01: And it's the only way for him to be the atoning sacrifice to satisfy what needs to be satisfied.
SPEAKER_01: And that is, of course, the just wrath of the Father.
SPEAKER_01: And so our hope is.
SPEAKER_01: Infinitely and eternally linked to the two natures of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: The theologians call this the hypostatic union.
SPEAKER_01: 100% man, 100% God.
SPEAKER_01: Truly God, truly man.
SPEAKER_01: Perfectly both.
SPEAKER_01: This truth of the Savior, in and of itself, is worthy of praise.
SPEAKER_01: To think that the eternally perfect one took on flesh for our benefit.
SPEAKER_01: Remember that when you say Merry Christmas to your family members.
SPEAKER_01: Fourth part of this foundation of our hope is that we see that Jesus is born under the law.
SPEAKER_01: Now you may say, why does that matter?
SPEAKER_01: Well, we'll get to that.
SPEAKER_01: In Matthew chapter 1, we read of the lineage of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: We see that Jesus is legally the heir of Abraham, tribe of Judah, seed of David, meaning he's a Jew.
SPEAKER_01: On his mother's side, recorded in the book of Luke, we see the same thing.
SPEAKER_01: Even through Mary's lineage, we think that's Mary's lineage.
SPEAKER_01: He's of the tribe of Judah.
SPEAKER_01: So Jesus is thoroughly a Jew.
SPEAKER_01: He's a Jewish man through and through.
SPEAKER_01: And what this means is that as Paul points out, he's born under the law, subject to the law.
SPEAKER_01: He's required to fulfill the law.
SPEAKER_01: Guess what happens if Jesus doesn't?
SPEAKER_01: We're still in our sin.
SPEAKER_01: No salvation, no hope.
SPEAKER_01: And so that's why it's really important that he says, born under the law.
SPEAKER_01: As Jesus is born in that manger in Bethlehem, just as the prophet Micah spoke of in the fifth chapter of his book, he's born under the law of Moses.
SPEAKER_01: And up until that time, no one, not Elijah, not Jeremiah, not Isaiah, David, John the Baptist, not even Moses himself was able to follow that law perfectly, were they?
SPEAKER_01: How about you and I?
SPEAKER_01: Not so much.
SPEAKER_01: But when that baby came forth in the manger, when Jesus took on flesh, those who were there were looking at someone who would be tempted, who would have the flaming arrows of the full quiver of the evil one flung at him, who would be assassination attempted upon him within his first two years, who would know suffering beyond any human ever born, and yet he would not sin.
SPEAKER_01: He would not fall into temptation as we so easily do.
SPEAKER_01: He lived the obedient life, the perfect sinless life that, by the way, you and I are all supposed to live, but could never after the fall.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, think about it this way: Jesus never once lusted after a woman.
SPEAKER_01: He never once stole from anybody.
SPEAKER_01: He never once hated his fellow man sinfully.
SPEAKER_01: He never once told a why, not even the white lie.
SPEAKER_01: He never once gossiped, for prayer, of course.
SPEAKER_01: He never ever denied the truth.
SPEAKER_01: He only told the truth in love.
SPEAKER_01: But more importantly, he never failed to worship his father.
SPEAKER_01: He never took his own name or the father's name in vain.
SPEAKER_01: He never created a false God to worship.
SPEAKER_01: And the devil gave him opportunity, didn't he, in the temptation in the wilderness.
SPEAKER_01: And he never spent one minute of any day deviating from the plan.
SPEAKER_01: What I'm saying is he is faithful, obedient, and he wholeheartedly obeyed the law and loved his heavenly father in it.
SPEAKER_01: He fulfilled the law, every jot and tittle, we say.
SPEAKER_01: In summation, he always did the Father's will.
SPEAKER_01: He's the better Adam.
SPEAKER_01: Born without sin.
SPEAKER_01: Lived a life without sin.
SPEAKER_01: God in the flesh.
SPEAKER_01: Not only this, but on the flip side of this, born under the law apart, what we find is that meant that he would therefore be killed under the law.
SPEAKER_01: On our behalf, in our place.
SPEAKER_01: Because we are condemned based on our sin by the rightness of the law.
SPEAKER_01: You understand that?
SPEAKER_01: And that's why the law is so good and yet a curse for us.
SPEAKER_01: But Jesus, who's born under the law, therefore condemned under the law inasmuch as he took our place.
SPEAKER_01: The law's demands were satisfied in him.
SPEAKER_01: Even the demand that there be death for lawbreakers.
SPEAKER_01: This produces something for us that is extremely important.
SPEAKER_01: Back to that hope piece.
SPEAKER_01: A confidence, an assurance, an expectation.
SPEAKER_01: It produces the gift of hope.
SPEAKER_01: The law's righteous demands were then satisfied in the incarnate Son of God because he's born under the law.
SPEAKER_01: So don't just read over that, born under the law.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, yeah, yeah, they're all born under the law of the time.
SPEAKER_01: There is something behind that, and it's huge.
SPEAKER_01: It's foundational for Christmas.
SPEAKER_01: Now we can say Jesus is the reason for the season and plant the thing in our yard.
SPEAKER_01: But when you're reading this passage, it expands it all the more.
SPEAKER_01: Now I'm not saying to list out 507 things about Jesus coming and put those all in your yard.
SPEAKER_01: That's going to be obnoxious.
SPEAKER_01: But to understand it in our minds, to be able to say, yeah, there's a reason I have this sign in my yard, the bumper sticker or whatever.
SPEAKER_01: There's a reason behind it.
SPEAKER_01: And let me tell you the specifics where we proclaim that.
SPEAKER_01: There's foundational truth to Christmas.
SPEAKER_01: So let's now look at the second part, the one that produces even more joy and hope.
SPEAKER_01: And that's the certainty that comes.
SPEAKER_01: There is certainty in your hope if you're in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Do you understand that?
SPEAKER_01: He did come, he does save, he's coming again.
SPEAKER_01: What more certainty do we need?
SPEAKER_01: What a joy we carry with us.
SPEAKER_01: I want us to see three immensely important aspects of our hope as we look into this.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 5 with me again.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 5.
SPEAKER_01: He came to redeem those who are under the law.
SPEAKER_01: Remember what we just talked about with the law piece?
SPEAKER_01: It's important to Paul and it should be important to us because while we don't live under the Mosaic Law in its fullness, we live under the Ten Commandments, don't we?
SPEAKER_01: We live under the truth of how to worship, how to interact with one another.
SPEAKER_01: We live under the law of God, what he has established.
SPEAKER_01: And so for us to understand what Paul's getting at, we need to understand first, though, that what the word redeems, what the word redeem means here.
SPEAKER_01: And think about it in Paul's context.
SPEAKER_01: Really, what the word redeem means that's put in here is to buy back.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, to purchase for a price, kind of like ransom.
SPEAKER_01: In the ancient Roman world, we've got to remember, about half the population were slaves.
SPEAKER_01: So this would have been easily understood by them.
SPEAKER_01: You could literally go buy a slave if you wanted to every day.
SPEAKER_01: If you're willing to pay the price, then you could buy them and set them free if that's your prerogative.
SPEAKER_01: But you had to give up quite a bit of money.
SPEAKER_01: Slaves weren't cheap.
SPEAKER_01: So the man with enough money could do that as his ministry, if you will.
SPEAKER_01: Go redeem a slave if he bought them and sent them on their way.
SPEAKER_01: Now, that would have been a cultural context for them that we don't really have right here.
SPEAKER_01: But if you're in Christ, minimally, this is what Christ did for you.
SPEAKER_01: But it's so much more, of course.
SPEAKER_01: It's one of the reasons he came to the earth to begin with.
SPEAKER_01: You were a slave to the things of this world.
SPEAKER_01: You were a slave to the law, a slave to sin.
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus looked at us and he chose to come down, he chose to suffer, he chose to die in our place, and he chose to purchase us, and the cost was huge.
SPEAKER_01: The cost was not measurable with gold or silver, it was not measurable with anything that could be mined or traded from this earth.
SPEAKER_01: It was his own blood.
SPEAKER_01: The cost was the blood of the Son of God.
SPEAKER_01: And so the hope that comes in the incarnation during Christmas includes the hope of our purchasing out of the bondage of slavery by the death that this baby will one day endure in our place.
SPEAKER_01: The baby in the manger was born for one purpose, and that's to die.
SPEAKER_01: Now, I know we're all gonna die someday.
SPEAKER_01: No matter how much kale we eat.
SPEAKER_01: But Jesus came to die 33 or so years into his life, and he knew from the start this is my mission.
SPEAKER_01: He knew the date.
SPEAKER_01: Redemption would be his mission.
SPEAKER_01: I said earlier that the Father sent his son, proving his divinity.
SPEAKER_01: Well, we've got to understand and remember the father is not naive to what's gonna happen to his son.
SPEAKER_01: He doesn't send him, he's kind of hopeful.
SPEAKER_01: He knows what's coming from before the foundations of the world.
SPEAKER_01: But as he looked on our condition, it was outside of relationship with him, he looked on us, again, from before the foundations of the world with compassion and decided to send his son to death.
SPEAKER_01: You see, Christ redeemed us from the curse of not being able to follow the law like he could and did.
SPEAKER_01: His law following gave us hope, the hope of eternal life, so that he might redeem those under the law.
SPEAKER_01: What this means is that Christ's followers now have forgiveness, peace with God, freedom from the bondage of sin, the promise of eternal life.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, the list goes on and on, but it also includes something else absolutely amazing.
SPEAKER_01: That redemption includes something that Paul goes on to say after this that is mind-boggling and awesome.
SPEAKER_01: He goes on to use a word.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 5 again, so that he might redeem those who are under the law, that we might receive adoption.
SPEAKER_01: Adoption.
SPEAKER_01: Into the depths of your soul.
SPEAKER_01: This is a soul-changing event to even grasp this.
SPEAKER_01: God did not just free us from the law and our slavery through redemption and then just send us on our way if that's not amazing enough.
SPEAKER_01: No, he even goes on to adopt us.
SPEAKER_01: And he signs our adoption papers after covering the immense cost, and he signs it, you could say, with his own blood.
SPEAKER_01: He doesn't just easily write on adoption papers, hand over a little bit of money, you know, and people depict that he hands over money to the devil and gets us back, right?
SPEAKER_01: No, not at all.
SPEAKER_01: First of all, it costs him far more than that.
SPEAKER_01: Only the blood of Christ would be sufficient payment for our treachery.
SPEAKER_01: But this payment wasn't made to the devil, it was made to appease the father's wrath, and so it was made to his father.
SPEAKER_01: And that ends up meaning for us that we are forever sealed as his children.
SPEAKER_01: And if we're tempted to think of our adoption lightly, let's remember two things.
SPEAKER_01: One, we already said the immense cost, but also, this reveals to us that not all are God's children in the redeeming sense.
SPEAKER_01: It's huge.
SPEAKER_01: Sure, all of humanity is made in his image, but not all our humanity are his adopted children.
SPEAKER_01: And so just fathom the hope and grace of Christ that you have.
SPEAKER_01: What that requires us to understand is that all humans from birth are the children of the world and the devil.
SPEAKER_01: We're his, living for a life of preparation for hell.
SPEAKER_01: But by his divine adoption, we're redeemed, pulled out of that slavery, and now called co-heirs with Christ.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, think about what adoption is in the earthly sense of things.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's a beautiful thing that mankind gives a status of kin to someone who is not naturally born into it.
SPEAKER_01: It's the parents calling the not naturally born children their own, their own children.
SPEAKER_01: This is one of the most beautiful pictures of love that we see on the earth.
SPEAKER_01: Even the Romans saw this as generous and loving.
SPEAKER_01: To choose this, to love somebody, to bestow on them the title of son or daughter.
SPEAKER_01: It's an act of true love, and it and it still is.
SPEAKER_01: Now think of that, though, in terms of the God of the universe.
SPEAKER_01: In the eternal sense of things.
SPEAKER_01: Think of that in the terms of the sacrificial way that we become sons and daughters of the God of the universe.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, if a son or daughter of an adopted family here on the earth is loved by his parents, what does that mean for the children of God?
SPEAKER_01: And again, if that's not glorious enough, if that doesn't shake up your whole world, Paul goes on to shed light on that.
SPEAKER_01: The incomparably rich nature of the adoption.
SPEAKER_01: I would say he goes on to tell us something that's eternally startling in this.
SPEAKER_01: Look at this third aspect.
SPEAKER_01: The certainty of our hope.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 6.
SPEAKER_01: So he says, You might receive the adoption of sons, and he says, Because you're sons, because you're his children, God sent forth the spirit of his son.
SPEAKER_01: Where?
SPEAKER_01: Into our hearts.
SPEAKER_01: What this means here is that we can now, as adopted heirs, cry out to him as Father.
SPEAKER_01: Even use the term that Jesus did, Abba, Father.
SPEAKER_01: That's a term of endearing respect and adoration.
SPEAKER_01: Anybody can say the words, use the words to call out to God, but only a son or daughter can cry out to God in this way.
SPEAKER_01: And he incline his ear.
SPEAKER_01: And so our adoption means that through the work of the Son, by the indwelling of the Spirit, we now have eternal and intimate relationship with our Heavenly Father.
SPEAKER_01: And so that manger scene, where we see the infant in a lowly state, it should point our hearts, our minds to the transformation that occurs.
SPEAKER_01: It should point us to the new birth that we now have in Him.
SPEAKER_01: It should point us to the fact that for those who are in Christ, we've been chosen and adopted into the family of God, never to be forsaken by the perfect Father in heaven.
SPEAKER_01: Never.
SPEAKER_01: The baby Jesus in the manger points us to eternal acceptance, eternal love.
SPEAKER_01: It does still point us to sin and death.
SPEAKER_01: Wickedness and rebellion, torture and wrath.
SPEAKER_01: But it also points us to the love of the Savior, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_01: It points us to the acceptance we receive as blood-bought children.
SPEAKER_01: And what that does is it produces hope.
SPEAKER_01: Hope.
SPEAKER_01: And so while we await death or his return, there is an eternal hope that we cannot lose.
SPEAKER_01: It's not a wishing.
SPEAKER_01: And so as the Spirit pours into our hearts and points us to our eternal placement as adopted sons and daughters of God, it produces confident assurance.
SPEAKER_01: That is why the Christian can look on the manger scene with tears and just see hope.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, he knows the baby's going to suffer greatly, but he also knows that this incarnate Christ child is the only chance he has for life eternal.
SPEAKER_01: The forgiveness of sins.
SPEAKER_01: For him to ever be declared by the Father as righteous, permitted into heaven.
SPEAKER_01: And so I want you to hear this.
SPEAKER_01: Because of Christmas, if you're in Christ, meaning that you've turned to him as your Lord and Savior, then you belong to the very family of God, proven by the indwelling presence of his spirit.
SPEAKER_01: That may sound overly simple, but it is really one of the most profound conditions and statements about who we are that can ever be made.
SPEAKER_01: Think about it this way.
SPEAKER_01: From before the foundations of the world, I can't emphasize that enough.
SPEAKER_01: From before the foundations of the world, the Father planned your birth and your salvation.
SPEAKER_01: And he also planned your adoption.
SPEAKER_01: It was all prepared, all accomplished through Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Everything is in order.
SPEAKER_01: Listen to Ephesians chapter 1, verses 3 to 6.
SPEAKER_01: Paul says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as he chose us in him before the foundations of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before him.
SPEAKER_01: In love, he predestined us to adoption.
SPEAKER_01: As sons through Jesus Christ to himself, according to the kind intention of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace, which he freely bestowed on us in the beloved.
SPEAKER_01: Just think about what that means for Christmas.
SPEAKER_01: From before the foundations of the world, he planned to send a son to you.
SPEAKER_01: From before the foundations of the world, he chose to bless us.
SPEAKER_01: From before the foundations of the world, he chose us.
SPEAKER_01: From before the foundations of the world, he chose to make us holy and blameless.
SPEAKER_01: From before the foundations of the world, he loved us, it says.
SPEAKER_01: From before the foundations of the world, he predestined us to that adoption through and in and to Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And all of this, all of it, is not according to his knee-jerk reaction, nor one of the members of the Trinity going, okay, come on, go hurry up.
SPEAKER_01: It wasn't that.
SPEAKER_01: It was it was according to the kind intention of his will, predetermined will.
SPEAKER_01: And it works out for the praise of his grace.
SPEAKER_01: You see, the hope of Christmas means that while he looked on us, he did not see us as adorable little babies in a box on the step of an orphanage, just ready for adoption.
SPEAKER_01: But instead, we're ugly, rebellious, hateful kids, and I'm talking sinfully, who live in defiance, who live in rebellion, and he looked on us and he just kindness, love, mercy, grace.
SPEAKER_01: He saw us and didn't even second guess his decision to send his son.
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus did not draw the short straw.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: He desired to come and do the will of the Father to save us and honor his Father.
SPEAKER_01: Gather us up as his children so that we could say, Abba, Father.
SPEAKER_01: So when someone asks you today, how does Christmas ever bring hope to you?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, isn't it just a baby in a manger with a bunch of shepherds and animals looking on?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, what can that do for you?
SPEAKER_01: Or maybe on the flip side, they don't know, and they just say, Isn't it about some fat creepy guy in a red suit who watches you while you sleep?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, how does that produce hope?
SPEAKER_01: How can that be a gift to you?
SPEAKER_01: You can tell them.
SPEAKER_01: Because of that baby, that baby who was preserved by God's sovereign will, who grew to be a man, in fact a godman, because of what he did.
SPEAKER_01: I've been adopted.
SPEAKER_01: My family is not the eternal family.
SPEAKER_01: Most of my family have no idea who the Lord is in order they want to.
SPEAKER_01: They're my family.
SPEAKER_01: God is my father.
SPEAKER_01: And praise God for that.
SPEAKER_01: What a joy.
SPEAKER_01: That's what Christmas points us to.
SPEAKER_01: That gift.
SPEAKER_01: That is an inheritance.
SPEAKER_01: You and I now have a real hope.
SPEAKER_01: Not this wishing thing.
SPEAKER_01: Not throwing coins in water.
SPEAKER_01: A hope that's centered around Christ.
SPEAKER_01: A hope that will never pass away.
SPEAKER_01: A hope that will never be defiled, that will never have a blemish on it.
SPEAKER_01: A hope that is protected by the power of God and being reserved for you right now.
SPEAKER_01: A hope that your family can know as well.
SPEAKER_01: Your neighbors can know as well.
SPEAKER_01: A hope that you can right now know if you have not professed Christ as your Lord and Savior.
SPEAKER_01: Do not wait another second if that doesn't describe you.
SPEAKER_01: If you don't have that hope.
SPEAKER_01: Your mother could have been horrible.
SPEAKER_01: Your family would have it could have been just dysfunctional beyond belief.
SPEAKER_01: Not just the uncle, but all of them.
SPEAKER_01: But through Christ, you can be adopted into a family that.
SPEAKER_01: That has the all-gracious, all-powerful, all-merciful God as the Father.
SPEAKER_01: A family that is eternal and eternally good.
SPEAKER_01: Imagine that.
SPEAKER_01: A good family in every aspect.
SPEAKER_01: A family that is just full of other adopted children.
SPEAKER_01: A family that together will look to Christ side by side for all of eternity and will be awestruck as we reflect on the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: And guess what the gospel includes?
SPEAKER_01: The birth of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: For all of eternity, we will marvel over this gift that has come.
SPEAKER_01: And the fact that we are now co-heirs.
SPEAKER_01: The hope that tells us through the indwelling presence of the Spirit, the Father loved us so much to make the provision necessary to adopt thousands, maybe millions of people.
SPEAKER_01: That's not an easy thing to grasp, is it?
SPEAKER_01: That's why we will just rejoice in it forever.
SPEAKER_01: In our inheritance.
SPEAKER_01: If you are in Christ today, you are no longer a slave to sin.
SPEAKER_01: You are free from the bondage of that and chosen by the righteous one for that inheritance.
SPEAKER_01: You are an heir of God, adopted son or daughter, not because you're worthy, but because he's gracious.
SPEAKER_01: This is what makes Christmas a story that literally changes everything for a person.
SPEAKER_01: It makes divine adoption possible.
SPEAKER_01: What a gift our eternal hope is, brothers and sisters.
SPEAKER_01: You're no longer a slave but a son.
SPEAKER_01: You are a child by the means of a choosing and loving adoption that was paid for in blood.
SPEAKER_01: What a gift.
SPEAKER_01: And so this is why we say, Merry Christmas.
SPEAKER_01: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_01: Father, we thank you for the truth of your word.
SPEAKER_01: We thank you that it continues to reveal to us the glory and majesty of your work, of your grace, of your justice being lived out and fulfilled in your own Son.
SPEAKER_01: We would ask you, Father, that you would continue to remind us of this, even as the presents are ripped open, even as the family time comes, Father, that we would remember Christ, that we would remember these truths, that we would look to a passage such as this and be overwhelmed.
SPEAKER_01: Overwhelmed, not in our own life, but overwhelmed in such a way that we would proclaim it to those near us.
SPEAKER_01: That we would realize the adoption that has come means that we are no longer who we once were.
SPEAKER_01: And so, Father, as we gather with families this Christmas, we ask you that we would realize our heavenly family in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And that we would cling to our family together.
SPEAKER_01: And that we would be overwhelmed day by day by day at the gift of the Christ child.
SPEAKER_01: Use us for your purposes in this season, Father.
SPEAKER_01: To lead and guide others to the truth.
SPEAKER_01: And now we pray that you would continue to lead us and guide us in worship.
SPEAKER_01: Even as we sing of the wondrous cross.
SPEAKER_01: We pray this in Christ's name.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.