Bible Commentaries
Galatians 4

V

INDUCTION INTO CHRIST

Galatians 3:23-4:20.

While in the last discussion we anticipated somewhat by dipping a little into Galatians 4, I commence this Galatians 3:23: "But before faith came, we were kept in ward under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed." The part of that verse that needs explanation is the word "faith." Faith is used in the following senses:

1. The act, or exercise, of believing in Christ. That is not what is meant by the word here, because the Old Testament people, looking through the types, believed in Christ and had witness borne to their faith, as we learn from Hebrews II. Therefore the error was radical when a Baptist preacher said that there was no faith in Christ until after Christ came and died, and no forgiveness of sins. And not only did I hear a Baptist preacher say that, but I heard a Campbellite preacher misapply it in the same way, saying there could be no remission of sins until Christ actually died, and then the sins of the Old Testament saints were remitted. But sins were remitted in Old Testament times on God’s acceptance of what the Surety would do at the proper time. We must not confound expiation and remission. I will give a financial illustration. Paul writes to Philemon: "If Onesimus oweth thee aught, put that to mine account." The very moment that Philemon charged it to Paul he could no longer hold it against Onesimus. It was remitted to Onesimus. The surety was held, and not the original contractor of the debt. It stood remitted against Onesimus, since it was put to Paul’s account. The debt was not actually paid to the creditor. Only the personal responsibility for the debt was changed. It was paid whenever Paul should pay it later. Just so God was in the world in Old Testament times not reckoning, or charging, or imputing their sins to them, but was charging them to Christ and reckoning them to Christ, and so sins were remitted just as freely in the Old Testament times as in the New Testament times, but the actual expiation was not made until Christ died. I quote from the "Philadelphia Confession of Faith" the following:

Art. VIII, Sec. 6: "Although the price of redemption was not actually paid by Christ until after his incarnation, yet the virtue, efficacy and benefit thereof was communicated to the elect in all ages successively from the beginning of the world...

Again Art. XI, Sec. 6: "The justification, of believers under the Old Testament, was in all these respects, one and the same with the justification of believers under the New Testament." And what is more authoritative than any confession of faith is the testimony of God’s Word in Romans 4:7 and 2 Corinthians 5:19. Nevertheless one should either subscribe to the confession of his denomination on vital points or quit the denomination.

2. Faith sometimes means the body or system, of gospel truths, usually preceded by the article "the." But evidently that cannot be the meaning here. In what sense then is "faith" used in Galatians 3:23? Here is the reading which supplies the modifying words: "But before the object of faith came we were kept in ward under the law." The object of faith is Christ, the antitype. The simple meaning of the whole section is, that an Old Testament believer, though his sins were remitted and he was justified, must yet observe the law of types until Christ came. Just as in Galatians 4 it says, "But I say that so long as the heir is a child, he differeth nothing from a bondservant, though he is Lord of all; but is under guardians and stewards until the day appointed of the father." Being shut up under the law meant that the Old Testament saint, though his sins were remitted by faith in the antitype, yet had to keep on fulfilling the requirements of the law as to feasts and ceremonies and the observance of days. He was in the position of an heir but had not yet ob- gained his majority, but had to keep up the type until the antitype came. We need to get that meaning clear in our mind, because in the New Testament an argument is based on it. We have Moses who had real faith, and David and Enoch and Elijah, who had real faith, but they kept up the ceremonial law. The form was symbolic in the Mosaic law, and in the law preceding Moses. Why do we not now do as did the early people? Because the object of faith came, and the heirs of faith are now out from under the law. We are not under stewards and governors as the Old Testament people were.

I now explain the next verse: "So that the law has become our tutor to bring us unto Christ." The Greek word is compound, pais, "a child." and agogos, "a conductor." Agogos is from the verb agein, to lead, or conduct. To complete the analogy we have only to refer to the heathen custom of entrusting the care of a child in his nonage, to a slave. This slave was not necessarily the teacher, in the modern sense of pedagogue, but would lead the child to the school where the real teacher would instruct him. So the law, a slave, leads to Christ, the great teacher. In this sense the law evidently was not to annul the previous covenant of grace, but was added to it in a subsidiary or helpful sense. But now that the object of faith is come, we are no longer under the tutor. In many places Paul thus argues against any lapsing into Judaism. It was going back to the rudiments, the weak and beggarly elements of an obsolete dispensation. The whole book of Hebrews is written on that subject.

So a man who observes the seventh day instead of the first day proclaims that he is still in the Old Testament.

We come now to a thought not discussed before, Galatians 3:26: "For ye are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus." The Jews, as Jews, were not sons by faith, but sons by lineal, fleshly descent. "For as many of you as were baptized into Christ did put on Christ." What is the force of "baptized into Christ"?

I had a Campbellite brother say to me, "You Baptists have no method of induction into Christ."

"What is your method?" I asked.

"We baptize into Christ," he said.

"How will you reply," I asked, "to the Roman Catholic when he says you Campbellites have no method of inducting Christ into you? You ask them how they induct Christ into men and they answer, ’By eating the flesh and drinking the blood of Jesus Christ in the mass.’ "

I reply to both, for the Catholic has better ground than the Campbellite – that each ordinance is a symbolic, pictorial induction. Baptism does not really put us into Christ. On the contrary, says Paul, "By faith we enter into this grace wherein we stand." Eating the bread and drinking the wine does not really put Christ into us, for by the Spirit Christ is put into us, or "formed in us the hope of glory." (See also 2 Corinthians 3:18; 2 Corinthians 4:6.) Baptism does not really put us into Christ; it is only figurative of it. Paul says, "By faith we are all children of God." By faith, and not by baptism, so that the form of being baptized into Christ is not the reality of putting us into Christ. In baptism we put on Christ, as an enlisted soldier puts on the uniform which is the external emblem, or symbol, of his enlistment.

The next verse calls for some explanation. "There can be neither Jew nor Greek, there can be neither bond nor free, there can be no male and female; for ye all are one man in Christ Jesus." What are the distinctions between the two covenants? Under the Mosaic covenant a Jew only belonging to the nation by fleshly descent was in the covenant. But in the new covenant it is neither Jew nor Greek. There is no distinction of nationality. That is the first point. They all come in just alike, as the animals went into Noah’s ark through one door. There was just one door; the eagle had to swoop down and go in the same door that the snail crawled through.

The second point of distinction is not national, but in Christ there is no distinction between a slave and his master. Abraham’s slaves were circumcised because they belonged to him. But in the new covenant the slaves of a believer are not baptized because they belong to him. Neither the relation of children nor slaves put them in the covenant and entitles them to the ordinances. Earthly relations do not count at all in the new covenant. Here the individual alone counts. The child of a preacher must himself repent and believe and must be baptized for himself. The preacher’s wife must repent and believe and be baptized for herself. She must take no religious step because of her relation to her husband, such as joining "his church" to be with him or in order to "commune with him." This passage means even more than that. In the old covenant only the males received the token of the covenant. In the new covenant there is no distinction as to ordinances between male and female. The woman is baptized as well as the man. If one was a slave of a Jew, the law required that the slave should be circumcised, becoming a member of the covenant through circumcision. Under the new covenant, it is clearly said that there is neither bond nor free – that a slave does not come in because he is a slave belonging to some one in the covenant, but comes in on his own personal faith in Christ, just as any other sinner comes in.

I repeat that the next point of difference in that verse is one of sex. Under the Jewish covenant only the male received the token of the covenant. The woman’s position in the Mosaic covenant was a very subordinate one, but in the new covenant the woman receives the ordinance of the covenant just the same as the man. She is a human being and comes in by her own personal faith in Christ, and is received by baptism just the same as if she were a man. So we see that makes a very important distinction in the two covenants.

Galatians 3:29 needs just a word of explanation: "And if ye are Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, heirs according to promise," whether a heathen, a Jew, a Scythian, Bohemian, a man, or a woman. If one gets into Christ by faith then he belongs to Abraham’s seed – not his fleshly see, but his spiritual seed, as Paul says, "He is not a Jew who is one outwardly, but he is a Jew who is one inwardly." The real circumcision is not the circumcision of the flesh, but of the heart. He is repeating what I have explained before: "But I say that so long as the heir is a child, he differeth nothing from a bondservant though he is lord of all; but is under guardians and stewards until the day appointed of the father." So the Old Testament saints as children were held in bondage under the rudiments of the world, that is, bound to observe those ceremonial laws of sacrifice and the entire sabbatic cycle. "But when the fullness of time came, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, that he might redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons." We are not children of God by ordinary generation. We are children of God by regeneration. When born naturally I was not in the kingdom, not in the church, not in anything religious, yet some denominations teach that the church consists of believers and their children. We don’t get in because we are the sons of some member that is in, or the slave, or the wife of somebody that is in – we do not get in that way. We come in by adoption. What is adoption? Adoption is that process of law by which one, not naturally a member of the family, is legally made a member and an heir of the family. Naturally we do not belong to God’s family. We could not call God Father.

Now comes a point more precious than any I have presented, Galatians 4:6: "And because ye are sons [by adoption, by regeneration], God sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father."

I remember as distinctly as I can remember anything that ever came in my experience, the day, the place, and the hour when in my heart I could say for the first time, to God, "Father"; when the realization of God’s fatherhood and when the filial feeling toward God came into my soul. That was when I accepted Christ.

There was nothing in the old covenant that gave one that individual assurance, that inward witness. It could not, as it came by natural descent, but here is a very precious thing in the new covenant that to all those who by faith enter into this covenant, there is given a witness: "God’s Spirit witnesseth with our spirit that we are the children of God." The filial feeling comes to us. The first time I preached on that subject I used this illustration: If I were to go to spend a night with one of the neighbors and, not knowing his children personally, would see the children come in from school, I could tell by watching them which ones were the children of that home and which were the neighbor’s children, without asking any questions. The real child of the house has perfect freedom. There is no form nor stilts. The little girls just run right up to their mamma and say, "Give me this," or "give me that," but the neighbor’s child is more ceremonious in making requests and taking familiar liberties, because there is no filial feeling. An orphan received into a home, after having been legally adopted, will at first be shy and distant. Only when by long usage the child begins to exercise the filial feeling does he feel that be belongs there. When in such case that filial feeling begins to appear in the child there is something that somewhat answers to the Spirit’s witness to our spirits that we are children of God and may say, "Father."

As a sinner I thought of God often, that is, his holiness, his justness and his omnipotence, and the thought was more terrifying than pleasant, but as a Christian there is nothing sweeter in the heart than when I think of God as Father. It is the sweetest thought I ever had – "our Father." He is no longer dreadful to me nor distant, but the filial feeling in my heart toward God gives me a freedom of approach to him. I count that one of the most precious blessings of the new covenant.

To continue: "So that thou art no longer a bondservant, but a son; and if a son, then an heir through God. Howbeit at that time, not knowing God, ye were in bondage to them that by nature are no gods [ye were ’idolaters]: but now that ye have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how turn ye back again to the weak and beggarly rudiments, whereunto ye desire to be in bondage over again?" We can understand how a slave should want to step out of bondage into the privileges of sonship and heirship, but it is more difficult to understand that a son and heir should desire to go back to the position of bondage.

I heard a Baptist preacher once say that repentance is "to know God." I told him that it was much more important for God to know us than for us to know God; that our title to heaven did not consist of our being sure that we knew God, but in being sure that God knew us; that many in the last day would say, "Lord, Lord, open unto us; we have prophesied in thy name," but he will say, "You claim to know me, but I never knew you."

A passage in Paul’s letter to Timothy is much in point just here. The apostle is describing how some who once claimed to know God had made shipwreck of the faith. He rebukes the idea of our standing in God’s sight by what we know, or claim, by describing the seal of a true Christian. This seal bears a double inscription. Un one side the inscription reads: "The Lord knoweth them that are his," and on the other side the inscription reads: "Let every one that nameth the name of the Lord depart from iniquity." This gives two real tests of one’s profession: (1) Does the Lord know him to be a Christian, as Jesus says, "I know my sheep"? (2) Does he bear fruit? Does he depart from iniquity? In other words, does the sheep follow the Shepherd? The passage is 2 Timothy 2:19 where he rebukes the errorists, who had overthrown the faith of some, by saying, "Howbeit the firm foundation of God standeth, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his," and, "Let every one that nameth the name of the Lord depart from unrighteousness." What a theme that is for a sermon!

We may be mistaken in thinking we are Christians, but he doesn’t make any mistakes. Spurgeon says, "Our title to salvation does not depend on our hold on Christ, but on his hold on us." We may shake loose our hold on Christ, but Christ doesn’t turn us loose. Peter turned loose and thought he was gone, but Christ did not turn loose, so Peter was not gone. That is why he changes that expression, "Rather to be known of God."

I was attending a meeting in Burleson County conducted by our Methodist friends (and they do hold some mighty good meetings), and a great many penitents went forward.

"Come into the altar and help those laboring souls," a brother said.

So I went and sat down by a man that was crying and groaning, and I said,

"My brother, what are you crying about?" He says,

"Well, I have been converted a dozen times and I always fall, and now I have fallen again." I said,

"Perhaps you are mistaken on one or the other of these points."

"No, sir; I know I am not mistaken; I know I was converted and now I have lost it."

"Then what are you crying about?" I asked. "Tears are quite useless in such a case."

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"On your statement," I replied, “your case is hopeless according to this scripture: ’For as touching those that were once enlightened and tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the age to come, and then fell away it is impossible to renew them again unto repentance.’ ”

"My friend," I added, "You see why this is so. I can neither help you nor comfort you in any way until you can give up one or the other of your positive assertions. You are making your fallible knowledge of two vital points the standard. What have I or any other preacher to present to you? If I present Christ as the only name whereby one can be saved, you say you have tried him and he failed. If I present faith as the only means of laying hold on Christ, you say you have tried that and it failed. If I present the Holy Spirit as the only one who can apply Christ’s blood and regenerate and sanctify you, you say you have tried him on all these points and he failed. I am sure I have nothing more to offer you. The only three-ply rope that can lift you to heaven you say has been broken in all its strands in your case; so there is nothing left for you but to get ready for hell."

He quit crying at once and said, "Maybe I was mistaken on one of those points."

"Just so," I replied, "and the sooner you can determine on which one the sooner I can direct you what to do. If on the first point, then seek a salvation you never had, just as any other sinner. If on the second point only, then seek healing as a backslider."

Galatians 4:10: "Ye observe days, and months, and seasons) and years." That is an unmistakable reference to the sabbatical days of the Old Testament economy – their seventh day sabbath, their lunar sabbath, their annual sabbaths and their jubilee sabbath, which means that one so doing prefers the Old Testament economy to that of the New Testament. Compare his strong teaching on this point in his letter to the Colossians (Colossians 2:20-23).

Galatians 4:11: "I am afraid of you, lest by any means I have bestowed labor upon you in vain." Here he questions not himself, nor what he preached, but fears that their profession was empty and vain. For if they had truly accepted Christ, why should they leave the substance for the shadow, thus practically saying that Christ had not come yet?

In Galatians 4:15 we note a question: "Where then is that gratulation of yourselves?" (American Standard). "Where then the blessedness ye spake of?" (Common Version). The point of the question is this: They counted themselves as so great beneficiaries of Paul in the first meeting that he to them was an angel from heaven, and their gratitude so great they were ready to pluck out their own eyes to give to him; it was marvelous that all this had so rapidly passed away, and a contrary attitude assumed toward him. It called for an adequate explanation which must be sought on supernatural grounds or the intervention of bewitching power. Mere fickleness of mind on their part, since he hadn’t changed, could not explain. Let the reader compare the prophet’s address to Ephraim and Judah (Hosea 6:4), and point out the expression in the famous hymn, "Oh, for a closer walk with God," based on the common version rendering of this verse.

We note another piercing question in Galatians 4:16: "Am I become your enemy, by telling you the truth?"

Many years ago I read an account of two visits of Henry Clay to Lexington, Kentucky. He was very popular in Kentucky. On one occasion the whole town turned out to welcome him. Houses were covered with banners, bands were playing "Behold the Conquering Hero Comes." Later he made a second visit to that town and they greeted him with rotten eggs.

What had changed them? Clay had not changed. A very beautiful incident occurred on that last visit. Among the crowd that was against him on the last visit was an old mountaineer, a hunter, with his long Kentucky rifle in his hand, who came up and said, "Mr. Clay, it breaks my heart to tell you. I have been standing by you all my life, but that last vote of yours in Congress has turned me, and I have to go back on you." Clay looked at him and reached out and took hold of his gun saying, "Is this a good old Kentucky rifle?" "Yes, sir; never a better." "Has it never happened when you were out hunting because there was no meat ’in the house, that you saw a big buck in easy range, and lo! your gun snapped?" "Yes, sir; it has happened." "What did you do – throw away the gun, or pick the flint and try it again?" The old hunter said, "I see the point; I’ll pick the flint and try you again."

In Galatians 4:17 Paul lays bare the motive of the authors of this sudden change: "They zealously seek you in no good way; nay, they desire to shut you out, that ye may seek them." Their object was to shut out their credulous victims from Paul that they might be sought as teachers themselves.

We come to two verses that need a little explanation: "My little children, of whom I am again in travail until Christ be formed in you" – then he stops and never does finish the sentence. There is a dash there showing that his own mind is in doubt as to whether they were false professors or backsliders. "But I could wish to be present with you now, and to change my tone; for I am perplexed about you." He did not know just how to treat them – whether to present a personal Christ to them as to those never having had any real faith, or whether to try to bring them back as backsliders. He could not tell what was in their hearts. He could not read them. "I am perplexed." "If I just knew your real state, I would know how to talk to you; if, like God, I could know whether you are Christians or not I would know what to say to you." So all preachers in their experience have that perplexity of mind when dealing with some people.

QUESTIONS

1. What is the meaning of "faith" in Galatians 3:23?

2. Give several meanings of the word "faith."

3. Illustrate a misinterpretation of faith in this verse.

4. Give the financial illustration of how Old Testament saints were justified.

5. Why did they keep up the ceremonial law, and why do we not keep it?

6. Explain the law as a pedagogue unto Christ.

7. What is the force of "baptized into Christ"? Give the position of the Campbellites, Catholics, and Baptists on this point.

8. What are the distinctions between the two covenants – (1) As to nationality? (2) As to slaves and their masters? (3) As to sex?

9. What is adoption, and upon what is this legal process based?

10. How is the fatherhood of God realized? Give the author’s illustration.

11. What is the result? (See Galatians 4:6-7.)

12. What is the difference between knowing God and being known of God, which the more important, and why?

13. What inscriptions on the Christian’s seal?

14. What is the reference in Galatians 4:10, "Ye observe days, months, etc.," and what Paul’s teaching on this in Colossians 2:20-23?

15. Contrast their present attitude toward Paul with their former attitude, and illustrate.

16. Compare the prophet’s address to Ephraim and Judah, and point out the expression in "Oh, for a closer walk with God," based on the common version rendering of Galatians 4:15.

17. What the motive of the authors of this sudden change?

18. What doubt is indicated by the dash in Galatians 4:19, and what the perplexity indicated by it?

VI

THE TWO COVENANTS

Galatians 4:21-5:12.

This discussion commences at Galatians 4:21, and we note first the distinct paragraphs in what remains in this letter. From Galatians 4:21, where we commence, to Galatians 5:1 is a distinct paragraph. That chapter division is very unfortunate. Galatians 5 should commence at Galatians 5:2. The next paragraph is from Galatians 5:2-6. There the most of the argument of the book ends, though he takes up an argument after that. The next paragraph Isaiah 5:7-12. The next paragraph Isaiah 5:13-26. The next paragraph Isaiah 6:1-10. Then we have the closing paragraph. It would be well if, instead of chapters and verses, the book had been divided on the paragraph plan as I have suggested, and as we would find if we were studying it in the Greek.

I call attention to some textual matters: Galatians 4:31; Galatians 5:1 ought to be really just one verse, and it is an exceedingly difficult matter, according to the manuscripts, to tell just how that verse should stand as to its parts. The oldest manuscripts are followed in the American Standard Revision. Lightfoot insists that we should read those two verses this way: "Wherefore, brethren, we are not children of a handmaid [or bond woman] but of a freewoman in the liberty with which Christ has made us free; therefore stand and be not entangled again in the yoke of bondage." That is the way Lightfoot would read it. It is just a question of the manuscript about the position of the words. The Revised Standard Version follows the best manuscripts, making it read just as we have it here, only it is not all one verse: "Wherefore, brethren, we are not children of a handmaid but of the freewoman. For freedom did Christ set us free: stand fast therefore, and be not entangled again in a yoke of bondage." I would call attention to a great many others of that kind if we were studying the Greek. In the Standard Revision Galatians 4:25 reads: "Now this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to the Jerusalem that now is: for she is in bondage with her children." Some manuscripts make that read: "Sinai is a mountain in Arabia." I don’t agree with those manuscripts at all. Everybody knows that Sinai is a mountain in Arabia, and the Revised Version follows the best texts in that.

We will now take up the exposition of Galatians 4:21: "Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do you not hear the law?" I call attention to the fact that what the law here says does not occur in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, or Deuteronomy, but it occurs in Genesis, and the point about it is this, that the New Testament as well as the Old Testament, calls the history in the Pentateuch law, as well as the legislation itself. The history is the background of the statutes – the whole of it. History and legislation is called the law. If we get that clear in our minds it will save us from the mistakes of the radical critics. Whether it be history in Genesis or legislation on Mount Sinai, it is called the law.

Galatians 4:22: "It is written that Abraham had two sons." He says the law (which is in Genesis) tells us that there was one by a handmaid and one by a freewoman. The next verse shows us the distinction between the births of those children. The son of the handmaid ’is born after the flesh – a perfectly natural birth. The son of the freewoman is born through promise. The birth of Isaac was just as supernatural as any miracle can be. There were no powers of nature in either Abraham or Sarah to bring about the birth of Isaac. It was supernatural. Now that is what the scripture says. Paul expounds that scripture in order to show that the Old Testament history is itself prophetic – that it has more than a literal, historical sense. It has that, but it has more. He says, "Which things contain an allegory." That part of the history of Genesis, besides its literal meaning, contains an allegory. Here the radical critics object to what they say is a strained interpretation that Paul puts upon plain history, and they say that he gets his allegory from Philo, an Alexandrian Jew, or he follows the rabbis in allegorizing the history of the Jewish people. Did Paul get the idea of the allegorical significance in that history from Philo the Jew, or from the rabbis, and if from neither, where did he get it? It is true that Philo did allegorize, but his allegories and Paul’s are poles apart as we see if we put them down and read them together as I have done many times. In the second place, Paul did not get the idea from what the rabbis had said, but he got it from the Old Testament, and particularly, from the book of Isaiah. The book of Isaiah consists of two parts. Isaiah 1-39 relate to one thing, and the rest of it relates to spiritual Israel, and it is called the Old Testament Book of Comfort. And whenever Isaiah from Isaiah 40 on, speaks of Israel, he is referring to spiritual Israel. For instance, in Isaiah 51 he refers to Abraham and Sarah, and then in Isaiah 54 he uses the language that Paul cites here in the context, showing that Sarah occupied a representative and allegorical position in his mind, and the quotation is specified here: "Sing, O barren, thou that didst not bear; break forth into singing, and cry aloud, thou that didst not travail with child: for more are the children of the desolate than the children of the married wife." That is Isaiah’s use of it in which he is addressing Sarah as representing the motherhood of spiritual Israel, and she that hath been barren is called desolate; because no children have been born to her, she is called more desolate than Hagar. So Paul gets his theory from the inspired people; he simply follows the history when he says, "that scripture contains an allegory."

Let us now see what the allegory contained. These women are two covenants. As, in the dream of Pharaoh, the seven lean kine are seven years of famine. Pharaoh uses the verb, "are" in the sense of "represent," is., the seven lean kine represent seven years of famine. And, as where our Saviour says, "this is my body," that is, "this unleavened bread represents my body." He is showing what the allegory represents – that those two women represent two covenants – one from Mount Sinai bearing children into bondage which is Hagar. The Hagar woman represents, allegorically, the Mount Sinai covenant. He goes on to say in the next verse that Hagar, that is, this allegorical Hagar that he is speaking about, is Mount Sinai in Arabia and answereth to the Jerusalem that now is and is in bondage with her children. Sarah represents the Jerusalem, not the Jerusalem that now is, but the Jerusalem which is above that is our mother. We, the children of the freewoman, represent the Jerusalem which is above. It is necessary to make clear the meaning of Jerusalem above as contradistinct from the Jerusalem on earth. In Hebrews 12:18 ff., distinguishing between the two covenants the two regimes, this language is used: "For ye are not come unto a mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, and into blackness, and darkness, and tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words; which voice they that heard entreated that no word more should be spoken unto them; . . . and so fearful was the appearance, that Moses said, "I exceedingly fear and quake." In other words, "Ye Christians are not under the Mount Sinai regime, but ye are come unto Mount Zion, . . . the heavenly Jerusalem." That is the Jerusalem above, or in the place of "heavenly" we may use "spiritual." We are not come to the literal mountain in Arabia, nor are we come to the literal Jerusalem situated over yonder in the Holy Land, but to the spiritual Jerusalem. How many of our hymns are written with that ideal In Revelation that thought is elaborated about the spiritual Israel, the spiritual city, Revelation 3:12: "He that overcometh I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go out hence DO more, etc.," and in the closing part of Revelation, "I saw the New Jerusalem come down out of heaven." In view of this, I point out the folly of the crusades, preached by Peter the Hermit and encouraged by subsequent popes. The object of the crusades was to rescue the Holy Jerusalem from infidels – that Jerusalem which has lost ’its value. They were to rescue the empty tomb of Jesus. The crusades did an immense amount of good, but there never wag a more profound piece of folly than to think it was necessary to rescue the city under the curse of God, with an empty tomb in it, as a religious duty.

We will go on with our allegory: "For it was written." Here he quotes that passage in Isaiah 54, and here is his conclusion from the allegory in Galatians 4:28: "Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are children of promise" – i.e., supernaturally born, regenerated – "but as then he that was born after the flesh [Ishmael] persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, so also it is now." The literal Jerusalem and the Judaizing spirit will persecute the spiritual Israel. Just as Ishmael did, so will the Jews do now. Galatians 4:30: "Howbeit what saith the scripture?" Notice then that the scripture is again personified. The words, ta hiera grammata refer to the whole collection of scriptures; every one of those scriptures is God-inspired. So Paul takes a part of the history in Genesis and says, "The scripture saith."

I am giving this to show the folly of the people who say, "The book contains the word of God, but not all of it is the word of God." Well, what did the scripture say? "Cast out the handmaid and her son: for the son of the handmaid shall not inherit with the son of the freewoman." Sarah used these words to Abraham: "This bond-slave child should not inherit with my child; cast her out and her son." It grieved Abraham until God spoke to him and endorsed what Sarah said, God having in mind not only what was best for them at that time, but having in mind the allegorical meaning of those two women.

Here is an important matter: The ablest debater that I ever read after was the great Presbyterian, N. L. Rice, and here let the reader note just what Rice said about the covenant and how the covenant puts the infants in the church. A certain man was once quoting Rice to me on that and he said, "The Old Testament put the children in with the parents; and now if it put them in, how are you going to put them out?" I said, "Here is the passage, ’Cast out the bondwoman and her son.’ " That casts the covenant out and infant membership. It is true that the children come in the new covenant; it is true that we baptize every child in the new covenant, but he is a regenerated child – a spiritual child – and nobody in the world can answer that. And yet I never heard a pedobaptist make an argument that he did not bring in the relation that the children bore to the old covenant, viz.: that they were in the covenant. That is their first and, indeed, their only respectable argument.

A certain Baptist wrote a book with this title: Baptists the only Pedo baptists, i.e., the Baptists are the only denomination that really baptize children. They baptize every spiritual child if he is only converted, and if his spiritual childhood is only an hour old. The Baptists baptize him, and others don’t do that; they baptize the goats – those that are not children. He makes a very fine argument, and if we just understand him, he is hitting the nail on the head. The Baptists don’t baptize anything but children, but they belong to spiritual Israel, and they often baptize them the very day they are new born. They don’t wait eight days.

Let us now consider those joined verses of Galatians 4:31: "Wherefore, brethren, we are not children of a handmaid, but of the freewoman. For freedom did Christ set us free: stand fast therefore, and be not entangled again in a yoke of bondage." Where does Christ himself discuss that just as Paul does? It is very important to see that Christ and Paul are in agreement in that very matter. John 8:31: "Jesus therefore said to those Jews that had believed him, if ye abide in my word, then are ye truly-my disciples; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. They answered unto him, We are Abraham’s seed, and have never yet been in bondage to any man: how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free? Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Every one that committeth sin is the bondservant of sin. And the bondservant abideth not in the house forever; the Son abideth forever. If therefore the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed. I know that ye are Abraham’s seed [that Is, the fleshly seed]; yet ye seek to kill me, because my word hath not free course in you." John 8:39: "They answered and said unto him, Our father is Abraham. Jesus sayeth unto them, If ye were Abraham’s children, ye would do the works of Abraham. But now ye seek to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth, which I heard from God; this did not Abraham. Ye do the works of your father. They said unto him, We were not born of fornication; we have one Father, even God." John 8:44: "Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father it is your will to do." Paul says, "For freedom did Christ set us free." I am showing that Christ taught precisely on the line that Paul did here in this letter to the Galatians.

I now commence Galatians 5:2. This paragraph consists of the following thoughts (in Galatians 5:2-6 he discusses circumcision): First, he says, "If you insist on circumcision Christ will profit you nothing. Second, if you insist on being circumcised, then you are a debtor to do the whole law. Third, if you insist on being circumcised and being a Jew in order to salvation, then you are severed from Christ; you are fallen away from grace."

A man once said to me, "Does the Bible teach falling from grace?" I said, "Yes." "Well," he says, "I thought you didn’t believe in apostasy." I said, "I don’t; we mean by apostasy, (1) that a man has to be regenerated and (2), that this regenerated man is finally lost. This falling from grace here does not mean that; it simply means that a man who will turn from salvation by grace to being a Jew in order to be saved, that that man is fallen from grace. The Bible does not teach that he severs himself from Christ."

The next thought presented here is that "Christians through the Spirit by faith wait for the hope of righteousness." What is the hope of righteousness for which the Christian waits? He is speaking of the doctrine of justification by faith, and that doctrine by faith had a certain hope in it. And what is the hope? The hope includes everything that is involved in the final coming of the Lord to give the crowning glories to those that are justified by faith; it has a hope that refers to the future. That hope is, If my name is written in the Lamb’s book of life, it not only stands secure, but it will bring everything else that it has promised, as "whom he justified, them he also glorified."

The next thought is, that "in Christ neither circumcision nor uncircumcision availeth anything." We don’t get into Christ because we are circumcised, and we don’t get into Christ because we are not circumcised. We get in on an entirely different term, as the next thought shows, "faith working by love." The Roman Catholics teach certain doctrines based on this verse, "Faith worketh by love," that is, they say that "worketh" should be translated "wrought." Therefore, the Catholics have a doctrine that they call fides caritate formosa, "Faith made by love," that is their special doctrine based on that verse. But the verb is not in the passive voice. It isn’t "being worked;" it is the doing, the working. And this leads me to another observation that when Paul talks about faith working by love he bridges an apparent chasm between him and James. James, in his letter, says that the faith that is apart from energy, or work, is dead. Paul says that the faith that justifies is the faith with energy; it works by love. As that passage bridges the apparent chasm, there is no discrepancy between Paul and James. Practically the argument closes here, but he brings up some argument later.

The next paragraph is Galatians 5:7-12: "Ye were running well; who hindered you?" Let us consider that as it is in the Greek’ the idea is that of a foot race. The foot race is along a prescribed or prepared track. Here is a man running on that prepared track, and suddenly he comes to a place where the track is all broken up. The word "hindered" means a broken-up track. "You were running well? Who broke up the track? He who started you would not break up the track ahead of you; if that track is broken up, the enemy did it." The next thought in this paragraph is that they seemed to have said that if they had gone astray it was a small matter, and he is answering that when he said "A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump." "You think the wedge ’is little, but that wedge will split the whole log. It is a vital and fundamental thing."

The next thought is the distinction which Paul makes between the Galatians and the one that side tracked them. He says, "Now, brethren, I am confident that you will come to my way of thinking about this. I don’t think that about the one that is misleading you." There he mentions him in the singular for the first time. "Whoever broke up that road will have to bear his penalty and will have to pay the penalty of what he has done."

The next thought is that he seems to reply again to an accusation that they had made saying, "Why does he object to our views of circumcision? I am told that he circumcised Timothy and preached circumcision himself." He answers that: "If indeed I preach circumcision as you are preaching it, i.e., if I am on a line with them, why am I persecuted?" Then he said, "If I presented it to you as they do I would take away the stumbling block of the cross and there would be no issue between me and these men who are misleading you." "The Jews find the cross a stumbling block," says Paul in his letter to the Corinthians. He says here, "I would that they that unsettle you would even go beyond circumcision." What does he mean by that? The thought is this: "You are insisting upon the physical mutilation of the body; now why not go to the whole length like the idolaters that were among you?" They mutilated themselves, cut their bodies with knives. "If you are going to insist on this use of the knife, why not take it to that extreme?"

QUESTIONS

1. What does the law of Galatians 4:21 say, where is it found, and what bearing has this on the meaning of the word "law," as used in the Old and New Testaments?

2. Explain the allegory in Galatians 4:21-5:1 from these standpoints: (1) Where did Paul get the idea of this allegory, and what the evidence? (2) Ishmael and Isaac. (3) Hagar and Sarah. (4) Jerusalem that now is and the Jerusalem above. (5) Show the parallel in the two covenants. (6) Give the distinctions as expressed in Hebrews. (7) What the folly of the crusades? (8) What the attitude of the children of the flesh toward the children of the Spirit? (9) What argument is sometimes made for infant church-membership, and what the answer? (10) Then who the children of the handmaid and who the children of the free woman?

3. What is the exhortation based upon this allegory, and where does Christ discuss this same idea?

4. What four things does Paul show are the result of their insistence on being circumcised? Explain particularly the last clause of Galatians 5:4.

5. What is the hope of righteousness for which the Christian waits?

6. Expound "but faith working through love." What the Catholic interpretation of it, and how does the true interpretation bridge the apparent chasm between Paul and James?

7. Explain Galatians 5:7: "Ye were running well; who hindered you, etc.?"

8. What is the force of "a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump"?

9. What distinction does Paul make between the Galatians and the one who side tracked them?

10. What accusation does Paul seem to reply to in Galatians 5:11, what the stumbling block of the cross, and what does he mean by "beyond circumcision" in Galatians 5:12?