Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

There are certain pictures which capture Paul’s imagination that he uses again and again: human birth and growth was one of them, Here he uses the image with reference to mental and intellectual development rather that to physical growth.

If we are to look for a link with the argument of chapter 3, it is probably to be found in the thought of the child’s being led to and from school by the tutor, but only while he or she was still a minor.

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ILLUSTRATION

In the movie The Avengers, an unexpected threat, led by the villain Loki, emerges that threatens global safety and security.

Nick Fury, director of the international peacekeeping agency known as S.H.I.E.L.D., needs some urgent help to pull the world back from the brink of disaster.

In one particular scene, Loki has an encounter with the Hulk.

As the Hulk blasts through a window, he intentionally crashes into Loki, slamming him against a wall.

As Loki scrambles to his feet, the Hulk begins to advance toward him.

"Enough!" shouts Loki.

"You are all beneath me," he defiantly proclaims.

"I am a god, you dull creature, and I will not be bullied by …"

Suddenly, while he is still speaking, the Hulk snatches Loki by the ankle and slams him on the floor five times.

As Loki lies on the floor, barely able to breath, his eyes fixed upward as if to say what just happened?, the Hulk walks away, looking back over his shoulder.

The Hulk scowls as he says, "Puny god."

Big Idea: “You make a puny God”

Three ways we make ourselves into our own God.

1) Living in a state of childishness

2) The difference between knowing God and being known by God

3) We are fare-weather follower’s of Christ.

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Galatians 4:1-7

1. Are you someone who embraces your adoption status or do you prefer living as a child?

The state of the OT church: it was like an under age child, and it was used accordingly being kept in a state of darkness and bondage, in comparison of the greater light and liberty which we enjoy under the gospel of Christ as adopted children of God.

It’s like when you first got your license to drive, you pull it out and show it to all your friends with great pride and anticipation.

Eventually it doesn’t become that big a deal anymore, it’s gets shoved back in your wallet or way back in your purse and forgotten about until someone asks for you to identify yourself.

We should be like the kid who just got his drivers license everyday of our lives.

Illustration

We are like an six-year- old boy with a broken Toy.

Imagine an six-year-old boy playing with a toy truck and then it breaks.

He is disconsolate and cries out to his parents to fix it.

Yet as he's crying, his father says to him, "A distant relative you've never met has just died and left you one hundred million dollars."

What will the child's reaction be?

He will just cry louder until his truck is fixed.

He does not have enough cognitive capacity to realize his true condition and be consoled.

In the same way, We lack the spiritual capacity to realize all we have in Jesus.

This is the reason Paul prays that God would give Christians the spiritual ability to grasp the height, depth, breadth, and length of Christ's salvation (; ).

In general, our lack of joy is as Shakespeare wrote: "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves" (Julius Caesar, , Scene 2).

We are like the eight-year-old boy who rests his happiness in his "stars"—his circumstances—rather than recognizing what we have in Christ.

A Child wants his way, and wants it now!

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Children in the OT - God’s greatest gift and guarantee of the covenant with Israel was that of children.

Despite every other gift, Abraham felt at a complete loss without children.

In early biblical times immortality was linked to living on through children who carried on the name of their parents.

We also see all through the OT where God favors the younger child over the first born.

In “for we know in part and we prophesy i n part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.

When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I reasoned like a child.

When I became a man, I gave up childish way.

For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face.

Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.”

*The elementary principles pass away once we move from childhood status to child of God.

We used to reason from a child’s perspective now we reason from a child of God’s perspective.

We are fully known by God.

Our insecurity regarding our acceptance with God is at the heart of why we make idols.

We look at our knowing of Him (which fluctuates so much) instead of His knowing of us in Christ.

We are desperately trying to firm up a positive self-image by using our idols.

Paul reminds us that the gospel shows us that we don’t need to make ourselves beautiful or lovable to God; He already knows us.

In ancient times coming of age was a big deal.

A Roman child-heir was a minor under guardian until age 14, and was still to some degree under guardianship until the age of 25.

Until the youth could exercise complete, independent control over his estate.

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The Adopted child

What are these ‘elemental spirits’?

The Greek word is stoicheia, ‘elements’.

, in Greek as in English, the word ‘elements’ has two meanings.

First, it can be used in the sense of ‘elementary’ things, the letters of the alphabet, the ABC which we learn at school.

It occurs in this sense in .

If this is Paul’s meaning here, then he is likening the Old Testament period to the rudimentary education of the people of God, which was completed by further education when Christ came.

“You need Milk, not solid food.”

By calling the law an “elementary principle,” Paul was giving the teachers from Jerusalem a remedial education.

Second, the way in which the word ‘elements’ can be interpreted is in regards to the universe.

These were often associated in the ancient world with either the physical elements (earth, fire, air, and water) or with the heavenly bodies (the son, the moon and the stars), which control seasonal festivals observed on earth.

See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ.

The adopted Child dies to the elementary things of the World.

vs. 20 If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you still submit to regulations?

Here the word is associated closely with philosophy and tradition.

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Christ came at the right Time

We can now see that the Church of God could not have endured gospel light earlier than the day of Christ’s coming; neither would it have been well to keep her in gloom beyond that time.

There was a divine fitness about the date that we cannot fully understand.

Why is the period in time right for Christ’s coming.

Various factors combined to make it such.

1).It was a time when the Romans had conquered and subdued the known inhabited earth, when Roman roads had been built to facilitate travel and Roman legions had been stationed to guard them.

2).

It was a time when the Greek language and culture had given a certain cohesion to society.

At the same time, the old mythological gods of Greece and Rome were losing their hold and power over the people.

3).

It was a time when the law of Moses had done its work of preparing men for Christ, holding them under its tutelage and in its prison, so that they longed ardently for the freedom for which Christ could offer them.

v.4

When time had come in human history, and it their own experience - “God sent his Son”.

It is the Son who makes us “of age”.

NOTE: notice that God’s purpose in coming was both to ‘redeem’ and to ‘adopt’; not just to rescue from slavery, but to make slaves into sons.

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How does the Son make us of age?

The Adopted Child has a claiming moment

First, by redeeming those under the law” (v.5), removing all penalty or debt.

As slaves we are obligated to keep it, but we cannot.

He removes the charges against us that we are incapable of removing ourselves.

Second, by producing for us “the full rights as sons” (v.5)

Through Christ we receive “sonship”.

This is a legal term.

As a wealthy man we could take one of our servants and adopt him.

At the moment of adoption, he ceases to be a slave and receives all of the financial and legal privileges within the estate and outside in the world as the son and heir.

Though by birth he was a slave without a relationship with the father, without a home, now he receives the legal status as son.

It is a new life of privilege.

For us to understand what God sent His son to do, we need to travel to an ancient slave market to appreciate redemption, and to an ancient wealthy household to grasp the concept of sonship.

Only together do they give us a complete picture of what Christ has accomplished for us.