God With Us

If you have your Bibles with you, open them to the Book of Galatians Galatians chapter four, Galatians chapter four. My assignment tonight is to address the subject of God with us, the incarnate God, Jesus Christ, the God Man. This is. One of the most crucial, critical, and neglected aspects of our theology. Neglected for a number of reasons, not least of which is people love Jesus as long as we're not too clear about who he is. Amen, somebody, if you want evidence of that, Christmas is the ultimate evidence of that. Amen. I'm not here to be a scrooge or anything like that. God bless you. I know you know the people will love Christmas, Christmas favorite time of the year and everything else. And that's great, God bless you. Amen, howly you praise the Lord for all of that. But here's what's interesting. I want you to imagine something. Imagine you know, in a few months, pastors standing up in their pulpits and saying, listen, at Eastern Jesus is the reason for the season. Pastors don't say that at Easter. Why because unlike Christmas, nobody's tempted to make anything else. The reason for the season. Or imagine a pastor around Easter time saying, hey, make sure we keep Christ in Easter. It's laughable to think that a pastor will say that about how often do we hear make sure to keep Christ in Christmas? Why because everybody loves Christmas. Not everybody, everybody, that's beyond everybody. Amen, you don't believe me. Listen to this from the Guinness Book of World Records. The most Expensive Christmas Tree, decorated sixteenth December twenty ten, the most expensive dressed Christmas tree was valued at eleven million, twenty six thousand, nine hundred dollars and was erected and displayed by the Emirates Palace in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates from December sixteenth to December twenty nine, twenty ten. That's right, that's right. We have so diluted. Christmas that a Muslim country has the Guinness World Record for the most expensive Christmas tree ever in the world, erected in the middle of a mall, in a country where you bet not convert to Christianity. Why because everybody loves Jesus as long as you don't define who he is, as long as you don't get into the nitty gritty of what it means for Jesus to be the son of God. Listen, if Jesus is just a good man and a good teacher, even a good prophet, he is completely acceptable. Mormons and Muslims alike love Jesus. Hindus and Buddhists are very happy with Jesus. As long as he's just a teacher who offers sage wisdom. Then Jesus is fine. But the minute you step across that line and argue that Jesus is more than prophet, more than teacher, that he is actually God incarnate, God with us, now, all of a sudden, those who were more than willing to gather with you scatter, because everybody loves Jesus as long as you don't define him. And there are so many places that we could go. When the assignment came down, I was psych really, I hoow, where can you just like? But here it is right here. We'll talk about a lot of passages, but I wanted to concentrate here in Galatians chapter four. I'll begin there in verse one, but really we get into this in verse four. I mean at the air. As long as he is a child, there is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything, but he is under guardians and messengers until the date set by his father. In the same way, we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. And here's our text. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the spirit of his son into our hearts, crying Abbah, Father. So you are no longer a slave, but a son. And if a son, then an heir through God. Now my official title is God with us my unofficial title. I know how to make them burn that Christmas tree in Abu Dhabi. All you'd have to do is stand there and explain this text beginning at verse four. And so we will go and we will stand in front of this tree, this eleven million. Dollar Christmas tree in Abu Dhabi. Decorated with one hundred and eighty one pieces of jewelry, rolex watches and diamond rings and all these sorts of things on it. That's why it's valued at so because you were probably wondering, right like, what kind of wood was that? No, it's not. It's not the wood, it's the things that they put on the tree, which speaks even more to the heart of the misunderstanding. Of what it was about. And so here we are, we're in Abu Dhabi, were standing in front of the tree, and we have all of our Muslim neighbors there around this expensive Christmas tree. And our Muslim neighbors may even look to us and say Merry Christmas as they stand around this Christmas tree. And so what do we say to our Muslim neighbors as we stand in front of this tree? Again? Official title God with us, unofficial. Title, I know how to make y'all burn down that tree. First. But when the fullness of time had come, the birth of Jesus was providential. The birth of Jesus was providential when the fullness of time had come, in. Other words, at the exact. Moment, when it was right, when it was time, in the fullness of time, because God is never early and he can't be late. In the fullness of time, when everything was exactly right, when everything was exactly as God intended it to be and the exact moment that God intended it to happen. God was not reacting to situations or circumstances. It was in the fullness of time. God did not decide that things had gotten so out of hand that something had to be done. This was in the fullness of time. God did exactly what he intended, exactly when he intended, exactly how he intended. The birth of Jesus was providential. In other words, the birth of Jesus was part of a plan. The birth of Jesus was part of God's. Plan, a specific plan for a specific purpose. We learned a little something about that plan in the next phrase. When the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son were already light in the fire. In the fullness of time, God sent forth his son. Jesus. Is not like God. He is not close to God. He is not almost God. Jesus is. God. In the fullness of time, God sent forth his son. All puts it this way in Philippians, let this mind being you, which was also in Christ. Jesus, although he existed in the form of God, did not consider equality with God a thing to be grasped. And Colossians he makes it clear that the fullness of the God had dwelled in him. The Triune God makes this clear at the baptism of Jesus, Jesus the Son is baptized. And when Jesus, God the Son is baptized, God the Father speaks from heaven and says, this is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased. So God the Father declares that the one being baptized is God the Son, and God the Spirit descends upon him in the form of a dove. We have God here in the fullness of time. God is executing a plan exactly when the plan is supposed to be executed, and this time is significant because of the very nature of the plan, and the nature of the plan is that God will send God. In the fullness of time. God sinned his son, by. The way, this is also significant. We're going to see that he's born of a woman. But before we get to born of a woman, I want you to recognize the implications here. It's not only an affirmative statement that Jesus is the son of God, but this is also a very important statement and that in a very important. Sense, he's not the son of Adam. How so well, Adam is our federal head and in genesis, when Adam eats of the fruit, sin enters the world, and through sin because of the sin of Adam, and that curse, that sin is passed to all of us by who are born by ordinary generation. In other words, we are all born in sin and shaped in iniquity, all of us who are born of man and woman, all of us who are born the ordinary way that people are born. When you are. The son of a man and a woman, when you are born and produced by the union of a man and a woman, what you inherit is Adam's sinful nature. And you stand under Adam's federal headship because that you're guilty. You're guilty because of Adam. Paul says this to us in Romans five. Makes it very clear that we are guilty because of Adam and because of his federal headship. Now, federal headship is very important, and it'll be very important in a moment, But in order for us to understand it's importance in a moment, we have to understand it's importance now. Because it's importance in a moment. When we talk about federal headship in reverse, we get to the place where people often want to argue with federal headship, and they want to say, you know, how is it that Jesus can die all those years ago? And how is it that Jesus can die and you know all of us can benefit from that? How is it that God can punish Jesus and all of us can benefit from that? In order to understand that later, you have to understand federal headship. Now you have to understand. That Atam is our federal head and that all of us were in Atom and guilty in Atom. When he fell, he stood in the stead of us all as our federal head And just like if our federal head today were to declare war, all of us, by virtue of being under that federal headship would be considered at war. Amen, by virtue of that federal headship. So what's being said here is important not only in what it affirms, but what it denies. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, his unique son, John says, in the beginning was the Word, and the word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. Through him, all things were made and apart from him. Nothing was made that has been made, and that word became flesh. How did he become flesh? Not the same way that you and I became flesh, as Isaiah had foretold. Behold, the virgin conceived and bore a son. And this son is called Emmanuel, which is God with us. There are those who have no problem giving up on the virgin birth. They argue that you can remove the virgin births, you can remove the resurrection, you can remove all of these things, and Christianity won't lose its essence. They could not be more wrong. If Jesus is born the same way you and I are born. That he is born having inherited Adam's guilt, and that's going to become important in a moment. But as the son of God, the unique son of God, he did not bear Adam's guilt. He was born of a virgin. We learn. When the fullness of time had come, God sends forth his son, born of a woman. And so now we have Jesus, who is the son of God and the son of man. Now we have Jesus who is fully divine as the son of God and fully human as the son of Man. Although being fully human, he was not born of ordinary generation. Therefore, unlike other full humans, he did not inherit Adam's sin. And yet. He's born of a woman. And the Angel comes and announces this, and it is achieved and happens just as he says, as Jesus, he is born of a virgin. You know, we often talk about birth being a miracle. We shouldn't, Amen, The birth of a child is a wonderful thing, but it's. Not a miracle. We know exactly how it happens, and if I had time, I could explain it to you, but I won't. It is not miraculous. It's about the most natural thing in the world. Miracles are supernatural. The birth of a child is absolutely natural. It happens every day, all day long. Amen. In fact, it is so natural and unmoraculous that we can pretty much tell you when it's going to happen, and we've become so good at that that when the birth comes, if it comes before you say your baby was early, and if it comes after you say your baby was late, why because you know it wasn't miraculous. It was completely natural, so natural that you can predict when it's supposed to happen. And you can. He acted so accurately that when it comes you don't say the prediction was wrong. You say the baby got it wrong. Here's the other problem with proclaiming the birth of a child as miraculous. I believe it. Steals glory from God because this birth of this child was miraculous. The real issue is why. When the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law. And he did this so that his son could redeem those were under the law. All of these things get us here. When the fullest of time had come, his birth is providential. God sent forth his son strategically, this is the son of God. He's born of a woman. We're making the point here that Jesus Christ fully human, born of a woman, but not born in the same way that all men are born, because if he was, he would have man's sin problem. He's born under the law. Which is significant and important as well, because he's born to redeem those who were under the law. Now, let's put it together. Go to Genesis. And let me make my point and burn this tree. Genesis chapter three, The serpent deceives the woman, and the woman eats the woman gives the fruit to the man and he eats, And so we have the fall of man, as man has disobeyed the command that God gave him in Genesis chapter two. And then we have God cursing in the order of the offense. The serpent deceived the woman, so he's first, the woman ate, She's second. She gave the fruit to the man. And he ate. He's third in line of these curses. But for our purposes, in order to understand our text and burn this tree, we just need to understand verse fifteen. Verse fourteen says the Lord God said to the serpent, because you have done this cursed, are you above all lives, talk and above all the beasts? Field on your belly you shall go and dust you shall lead all the days of your life. I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring or seed and her offspring or seed. He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel. Sin comes into the world, and. Judgment comes because of sin, and judgment. Starts with the serpent. And the judgment on the serpent has to do with the fact that the woman is going to bear a seed. And at some point. We don't know when the seed of the woman is going to crush the head of the snake, even though the snake is going to bruise his heel. Now, the text doesn't tell us when this particular promised seed is going to come. However, when the fullness of time had come, the promised seed. Now it was necessary that the promised. Seed be born of a woman. Otherwise God lied to the snake and to you and to me. He says, I'm going to put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed. So whoever comes to deliver us from the sin of the first atom has to be born of the seed of the woman. But somehow he cannot inherit the sin of atom. That's why, when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son born of a woman. No, no, why is this significant? This is significant because the wages of sin is death. Amen, that's what we owe. If Jesus has sin of his own, if he's born of ordinary generation like you and me, then he has a sin debt to pay, and he can't pay anybody else's. But because when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son born of a woman, something else could happen. By the way, He's not just born of a woman. He's born under the law so that he might redeem those who are under the law. And what does this redemption look like. I'm so glad you asked, because both sides of this are incredibly important. He's born under the law because we are guilty born in sin. But we are also guilty because this sin nature is the very reason that we break. And violate the law of God. So we have a double problem. Problem number one, we have the sin that we were born with, and we're guilty because of that. Problem Number two, we have this law of God that we are commanded to keep, and because of the sin that we're born with, we are wholly unable and unwilling to keep this law. So any man born of ordinary generation is going to have this same problem. Number one. God requires those of us who were born under the law to keep the law and be actually righteous. But you will not and cannot keep the law and be actually righteous because you're born under the federal headship of Adam. And with a sin nature, you in trouble. What has to happen. The seed of the woman has to be born without a sin nature. Number one and number two, he has to be born under the law and keep the whole law so that he can be actually righteous, which is why this is God's son, because he is the only one who can be born without a sin nature and can keep the whole law. Why is this significant, I'm glad you asked, because he has to fulfill two sides of the redemption coin through what is often referred to as his active and his passive obedience. In his active obedience, he keeps the whole law and he is actually righteous, which is important because. That means he can impute actual righteousness to you and to me. And you can't stand before God without actual righteousness, and you can't gain that righteousness because you're born in sin. So Christ keeps the whole law and it is actually righteous, and he can impute that righteousness to you. But then, as a man, Christ can actually take the penalty that we owe to God for our sin and deal with the other side of it, so that now there can be a double imputation. My sin imputed to Christ, who is born of a woman, and can therefore have my sin placed on him because the sin belongs to man. But because he's the god Man. His righteousness can be imputed to me, so that Christ can die a vicarious, substitutionary atoning death on my behalf, satisfying the wrath of God against my actual sin and my inherited sin, and impute to the righteousness that is required for me to stand before God in right standing and righteousness. This is why, when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law. Why because, as Isaiah says, all we like sheep, had gone astray, each of us had turned to his own way. We're ruined. We're ruined. But what happens. God made him who knew no sin, to be sin for us in order that we might become the righteousness of God in him. Christ died for sin, once for all, the just, for the unjust, in order that he might bring us back to God. This is why the doctrine matters. Because without it you can't square this circle. If Jesus is just good man, I don't care how good a man. He is, a good. Man who is born of ordinary generation inherits Adam's sin. And because he inherits adam sin, he inherits Adam's sin nature, and he cannot obey the love of God. And therefore, because it is appointed that the man wants to die and then face the judgment, even the best of men will be condemned, even if he's a good teacher, being a good man, it is not enough. Being a good teacher is not enough. Jesus is a good teacher. That is excellent. Praise God for good teachers. But riddle me this, batman. What can you teach me that will take away my sin nature? What can you teach me that. Will enable me to keep the law when I am completely and utterly bent against it, when I hate God's law and I hate God's righteousness? What is it that you can teach me that can overcome my sin nature? What is it that you can teach me? And by the way, if you boil every other religion in the world down. You boil it down to this. It's an oversimplfication, but not by much. You need to have a religious experience, and then from that moment on do more good things than bad things and hope for the best when you die. And you and I both know there's two problems with that. Number One, I can't be good. If you can't say a man you ought to say. Out, I can't be good. I've tried it, I can't do it. I just can't. And even when I have achievements in the area of trying to be good, I get proud of the fact that I was good, and then the pride is not good. I got to start all over again. Here's the second problem. What about all my sin before my religious experience? Even if I could possibly balance the tables from here on out, and I can't, I didn't start with a clean slate. So if Jesus is good man and good teacher, his teaching cannot and will not suffice. Even if Jesus is a good man and good teacher and good prophet, what can a good prophet do other than to remind me of the fact that I am born under the federal headship of Adam, and therefore have only death, hell, and the grave to look forward to. Thank you very much. None of that is efficient. The only thing that will work. Is if, when the fullness of time had come, in God's perfect providence, he sent forth his son, therefore escaping the guilt and having the power to obey, born of a woman, therefore representing. The rest of us. In humanity, who are guilty, born under the law, therefore being able to achieve perfect righteousness and impute that righteousness to those of us who have none of our own, so that He might redeem those who are under the law, therefore being able to impute our sinfulness to him and to carry it. To the tree. All that's good, But wait, there's more, so that we might receive adoption as sons. It would be enough if we just missed Hell. Amen, But he does this so that we might receive adoption as sons. In other words, Christ, the eternal Son of God, wraps himself in flesh, clothes himself in humanity so that he, as the Son, can redeem us, pay for our sin, reconcile us to God, not just so that we miss Hell, so that we too can be adopted as sons. What does that have to do with burning the trees. Well, if the tree is not on fire yet, it's about to be. First of all, this Jesus is not just a baby and a manger. The baby's in the manger for a purpose, and the babies in the manger because we are all guilty and alienated from God. And the babies in the manger, because it is only through the baby and the manger, who grows up lives a perfect life, dies a substitutionary atoning death on the cross, raises again on the third day, ascends to the right hand of the Father, where he ever makes intercession for us. It is only through that that we can actually become sons and daughters of God. You know, one of the reasons people love Christmas because it reminds them that we're all God's children. I don't want to be overly technical, and I'm not trying to get messy, but if we're all God's children, I'm not understanding something here. My wife and I have children who came into our family biologically, and we have children who came into our family through adoption. And the ones who came into our family through adoption became our children, and they had to become our children because before they were adopted, they were not. Our children. So if. Christ came to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons, then that means that we were not sons or we are not sons prior to that adoption. And not only are we not sons, but we're enemies, rightly deserving the wrath of God. And that may sound ugly, and it is. In fact, it's uglier than it sounds. But it's only when you understand the ugliness of that that you you understand the beauty of our adoption in Christ. Jesus is God with us, so that we might be with God. Verse six. And because you are sons, God has sent the spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying Abba Father. By the way, just like we heard earlier, do you see the Trinity here? First we see the Father in the fullest time had come, God sent forth his son, and we see the Son. Now we see what the son does verse six. And because you are sons, God send forth the spirit of his Son, and your heart's crying Abba Father. In that one verse we get all three. But in the whole of this passage we get all three persons of the Trinity, the Triune God working this out, saving us and adopting us. So you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God. This doctrine is essential. This doctrine is non negotiable. Without Christmas. You don't get Easter without God. Sending forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who are under the law. Then Christ pays for his own sin at the cross and thereafter in Hell eternally separated from God. And he has no redemption to offer you and me. But because he is the god Man, because he is God with us, he is innocent of Adam's sin. Because he is the god Man, he can represent those of us who inherit Adam's sin. And because he is the god Man, he can keep the whole law for his people and suffer the punishment due to their sins. Anybody being catechised out there, and because of the beauty of this. We can be adopted. Listen to this. From our confession Second London Adaptist Confession of sixteen eighty nine. Adoption the forgotten. Step in the order salutis everybody talks about, you know, justified, sanctified, glorified. You're missing a step and it's an important one. We're justified, adopted, sanctified, and glorified. Listen to this, just one paragraph in the confession. God has granted that all those who are justified would receive the grace of adoption in and for the sake of his only son, Jesus Christ. In and for the sake of his only son Jesus Christ, my adoption is not only contingent upon, but it is because of and for the sake of. His only son Jesus Christ. By this they are counted among the children of God, and they enjoy the freedom and privilege of that relationship. They inherit his name, receive the spirit of adoption, have access to the throne of grace with boldness, and are enabled to cry ah Bah Father. They are given compassion, protected, provided for, and chastened by Him as a father. Yet they are never cast off, but are sealed for the day of redemption, and inherit the promises as heirs of everlasting salvation. That's what we get from God with us, and that's why it matters that Christ is God with us. That's why it's not enough for. Him to be good man, good teacher, good prophet, because there is no salvation in good man. There is no salvation in good teacher, there is no salvation in good prophet unless that good man who was a good teacher and the good prophet was also God with us. Let's pray, gracious God, our Heavenly Father, you bow before you, thanking you for your son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and confessing to you that we are guilty of taking him for Granted, that we are guilty of thinking too little of him. Grant by your grace. That we might have a more full and meaningful understanding of who Christ is as God with us, and the more full and meaningful understanding of our communion with Him as our Lord and our Savior and our redeemer, and the communion that we have with the Godhead, communion with the Father because of the Son, by the power of the Spirit, Grant by your grace that we might fully embrace these doctrinal realities, so that our faith might be more so, that our lives might be more so, that our walks might be more so, our worship might be more. This is our desire, and we ask it in the name of your son, the Lord Jesus Christ, God with us Amen.