From Custody to Freedom

From Custody to Freedom
Galatians 3:15-4:10
August 17, 2025 

As we continue our study in the book of Galatians, you’ll remember that last week we spoke about the fact that righteousness can only come through faith. We see Paul showing that we can only be saved by grace, and not by the law.

The danger, though, is that the law can be vilified. If grace is amazing, which it is, and we perceive the law as opposite of that, is the law bad then?

Do we now just ignore, or even oppose the law? Since I said last week that the moral code and laws of society are based on the ten commandments, does that mean that we are no longer subject to any law?

People ask, ‘so if we are no longer under the law, do we not have to listen to the government, or parents, or leaders since we are free from the law? People even say, if I am free from the law as a child of God, then I don’t have to adhere to the laws of the land, because I now stand under Christ. So, I don’t have to, for example, pay taxes anymore.

Just a quick clarification when talking about law. We need to clarify what we are dealing with.

The focus is that we are not made righteous before God by keeping the law.

But Paul expressly says in Romans 13 that we should be the most law-abiding citizens. When they tried to trap Jesus on questions of taxes, Jesus said,

Mark 12:16-17, Whose likeness and inscription is this?” And they said to Him, “Caesar’s.” And Jesus said to them, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” 

That being said, if then to be justified, the law looks like the opposing force to grace, is it then bad in that context?

If not understood correctly, it might seem like Paul is contradicting the Bible,  because the Bible clearly states:

Psalm 19:7-8,  The law of the Lord is perfect (flawless), restoring and refreshing the soul; The statutes of the Lord are reliable and trustworthy, making wise the simple. The precepts of the Lord are right, bringing joy to the heart; The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes.

Paul addresses it in this section. What was the intent and the function of the law and how does it apply to us today?

Paul is again going to show the difference between the law and grace, but this time, he shows that the covenant of grace was God’s plan all along, since He gave the promise of blessing to Abraham. Yet the law had a role to play and still plays a role today.

I. God Ratified the Covenant

• Paul starts by giving an example of an earthly will and testament. If someone dies, their last will and testament, when it has been ratified, cannot be changed.
• He then refers them back to the covenant God made with Abraham. This was the first foundational covenant and it was ratified by God.

A. The Covenant was made with Abraham and his Seed

• We see in Genesis 15, that Abraham asks God how he can be sure that the promises God gave him would come to pass. God told him to bring various animals, cut them in two, and place them on opposing sides.
• To make a covenant between two parties, they would walk in a figure 8 between the offering.
• But something interesting happened. The Bible says that God put Abraham in a deep sleep, and there appeared a flaming oven and a burning torch that passed through these animals. It was a sign that God was making a covenant with Himself that He would bless the nations through Abraham and His seed.
• It is important to realize that God did not make a covenant with Abraham dependent on Abraham. He was not the one walking through the sacrifices with God, giving Him equal responsibility. God put him on the sideline and walked in Abraham’s place through the sacrifice. The reason for it was that Abraham was fallible. He could never perfectly equally uphold the covenant.
• I suggest that it was God the Father and God the Son walking through the sacrifices ratifying the covenant which God Himself would pay the price for and Abraham and his descendants would be the beneficiaries of this covenant.
• We see this in the very important point Paul is making. God didn’t make the covenant with Abraham and his seeds, in other words all of his descendants after him, but God was referring to a specific person. It was the Messiah, Jesus, his Seed, through whom all the nations of the earth would be blessed.
• This covenant was pointing to an earlier statement when God told Adam that there would be enmity between the serpent and his Seed, referring to Christ.
• Abraham’s responsibility was to put his faith in God, believing in God’s faithfulness to perform what He has promised.

Genesis 15:6, Then he (Abraham) believed in the Lord; and He reckoned it to him as righteousness.

• This becomes the foundation of salvation. Through faith we become recipients of the blessing and are blessed and become part of the blessed ones through Abraham. We are made heirs of the covenant if we put our faith in Jesus and are then baptized into Jesus.

B. The law needed two parties

• Verse 19 – The perfect law was given to a mediator, Moses. But a mediator suggests that there are two parties that need to be mediated between.
• This shows that the law was not the same as the covenant with Abraham where God swore to Himself. The law was dependent on the faithfulness of both parties. Again, the function of the law was not to be an appendix to the covenant God made with Abraham.

II. The Law had a Function

• So where does the law come in? This is where Paul then brings it into perspective. The law was given 430 years after God made the covenant with Abraham.
• Just like you cannot add or change an earthly testament that has been ratified, so the law can also not be added to the covenant that God made with Abraham.
• It cannot be added as a condition to be saved or to be made righteous. That was never the function.
• This is exactly what the Judaizers were effectively teaching. And it is the same today if we say and teach that salvation is dependent on the works that we do.
• Works has its place and we will address that later, but our salvation is not dependent on it.
• If we want to add the law to salvation, it is like stepping into the covenant agreement with God yourself and walking in between the sacrifices. That would be like Abraham coming out of his slumber and replacing the torch or the flaming oven, wanting to ratify the covenant himself and thereby taking responsibility for it.
• We have already established that because grace is good it doesn’t make the law evil. And Paul then clearly gives the intent of the law.

A. The law was given because of transgression  

• Humanity, including Israel, was sinful and broken. God was looking for a nation through whom He ordained that the Messiah would come.
• He chose Israel for this purpose. For this to happen though, they had to be set apart. They needed something to be measured against. If they were going to be God’s people and be holy, they had to know what holy meant. They could not worship the same gods and do the same practices as the other nations.
• God had to show them His absolute standard and His absolute standard was His own holiness and perfection which the law reflects.
• Measured against that they were able to see their own transgressions and brokenness which was an example of the brokenness of all of humanity.
• God then put laws and statutes in place indicating that only a blood sacrifice could cover their sin, in other words, something had to die for them to be forgiven. God then masterfully put in place foreshadowing and types that would reference and point to the Messiah through the sacrifices and rituals that was needed for their forgiveness.
• This made them see the need for a Messiah. As a nation, they became the vessel God set apart and used for this purpose so that there would be a testimony and a pointing to Jesus Christ who would be the only one to fulfill all the types, rituals, and prophecies pointing to the Messiah.

B. The law kept them safe

• Not only did the law show them their fallibility, but it had two other functions as well.
• Paul Says that before faith came, they were kept in custody under the law until faith would be revealed.

Illus – This is like when someone is put under protective custody. You are kept in a cell or in a safehouse for your own good. Unfortunately, many don’t like being in that situation until they have a real life experience of the danger… This is the plot of many movies…

• The enemy wanted to destroy the lineage that the Messiah would come from. And when Israel was chosen by God, he had his sights trained on them. Therefore, God gave them guardrails to protect them, and warned them against not following the ways of the world.

Leviticus 19:2, “Speak to all the congregation of the sons of Israel and say to them, ‘You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy. 

• The law also became a tutor, pointing to Christ. Although Israel was like a rebellious teenager, and many times even like a harlot or adulterous wife running after the gods of the other nations, there was always a remnant, a group of people who had hearts after God, calling the nation back to God, pointing to the standard that God has set.
• This becomes a picture of those who have not come to Christ yet. The heart of man is evil and instead of trying to follow the law and be made better by the law, sin is empowered by the law. The law was given to try and restrain by giving a principle to strive after, but the flesh in its own human efforts is too weak to live according to it.

III. We are now Sons of God through Christ

• The law, as we saw was only a temporary placeholder until God’s purpose for it was fulfilled with the sacrifice of Christ.

A. We are sons of God through faith

Galatians 4:1, Now I say, as long as the heir is a child, he does not differ at all from a slave although he is owner of everything, but he is under guardians and managers until the date set by the father. 

• We were created in the image of God, with the original plan being that we would reign under His authority with authority. That was the dominion given to Adam.
• Yet, with the fall of Adam, we were stripped of authority and surrender it to Satan.

2 Corinthians 4:4, in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel…

• God put us under the guardianship of the law until Christ came and made a way for us to be adopted as sons, thereby restoring our authority through Jesus.
• Now that Christ came, He fulfilled the law perfectly on our behalf. The law led us to Christ so that we can be justified by faith if we put our faith in Him. So, we no longer need a tutor, but are adopted as sons.

Illus- Kids need the law until they can grasp the heart of the thing. A son with the right heart, as he comes of age, grasps the heart of the father. Let’s say you force your son to take out the trash. Then one day he visits a friend’s house…

• The law was given as a moral standard, but it also indicates God’s standard. Grace does not lower God’s standards. But it was met and fulfilled by Jesus.
• We do not proclaim ‘cheap grace’. We are not saying “ Thank God for grace that covers my sin, so now I can go out and sin as much as I want.” That is the attitude of a prodigal son with an unchanged heart.
• Someone with that attitude is not saved. Putting our faith in Jesus means being baptized into Christ, dying with Christ, then being clothed with Christ, His Spirit dwelling in us.
• Now we are children whose hearts have been changed. We now are aligned with the heart of the Father, directed not by the law, but directed by the Spirit. But remember, the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God, aligned perfectly with the will and law of God.
• Now we set our minds not on the things of the flesh, but the things of the Spirit.

Rom 8:1-6, Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, 

• The law of the Spirit does not give us freedom to live in sin, but to lead, guide and change us to become more holy. Now that we have the Spirit of God living in us, our hearts are in principle aligned with the will of God.
• It changes your nature, it changes your perspective, it changes your heart’s desire. It changes your focus. Jesus becomes your everything. You are thankful for His amazing grace that has made a way to Father, saving you from eternal damnation.

B. Don’t turn back

• After all this, Paul says, now that you know God and is known by God, adopted as sons, why do you revert back to the worthless elemental, beggarly things and desire to be slaves again? Why do you again observe special days, months, seasons, and years?
• It has been fulfilled by Christ which it was a shadow of. Why do you become a slave again after being adopted as sons?

Illus- We had a nanny when the kids were young. I relegated  my authority to her when I was not there to manage the do’s and don’ts… Now that the kids are adults, they don’t stand under that authority anymore.

• It speaks of a mentality, a frame of mind. Trying to follow the law apart from the Spirit disrupts personal relationship. It is difference between coming to God as beggar, focused on my inadequacies, or boldly coming before my Father because of my faith in the finished work of Jesus.
• A slave focuses on doing the right thing not to get in trouble, following the rules meticulously. A son lives the rules and principles automatically because it is part of His heart and new spiritual DNA.
• Your spirit is now restored into the image of your Father. You are led by the Spirit. You SURRENDER to the Holy Spirit to be aligned with the word which is the heart of God.
• You need to let go of trying to be good enough by upholding the law. Let go of the slave, beggar mentality. Live in the freedom and under the direction of who you are in Christ.