Christmas is God purchasing our freedom and fellowship

Gal. 4:1-7

When I think about Christmas and all the implications, I find myself viewing God’s determination to bring us into an intimate relationship with Christ.

Last week we shared that Christmas is God fixing what Adam messed up through eating of the fruit.

Today, the Lord is saying that Christmas is a shopping spree for souls.

There are some women who love to shop and they would drive all the way to Miami or Atlanta, Georgia to shop.

Well, when you want something bad enough distance and cost is not an issue.

The Book of Galatians suggests contextually that Christmas is God coming to do what the law could not do, and that is to save souls from a burning hell.

Romans 8:3-4, “For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.”

Well, some of the Jews in Galatia thought they could through the works of the flesh, save themselves from a burning hell.

Some of them who had confessed to be saved but wanted to go back under the bondage of the law.

Gal. 3:1, “O foolish Galatians who hath bewitched you that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified among you?”

They were sinners as we were, and a sinner cannot save himself.

They were slaves to sin and Satan and did not have the resources to purchase their freedom.

My brothers and sisters, that’s what Christmas is all about, the Savior coming to purchase sinners.
 
  1. Without Christ (Christmas) we are all slaves- vs. 1-3.
  2. Christmas is God’s shopping spree for souls- vs. 4.
  3. Christmas (Christ) is God’s purchaser- vs. 5
  4. Christmas (Christ) brings us into sonship and fellowship with God- vs. 6-7.

I get happy when I think about where I am now, and how I got where I am.

I am a son of God, and I am in an intimate fellowship with God the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost

I once was lost in sin but Jesus came and found me, He brought me out of darkness into the marvelous light.
 
  1. Without Christ (Christmas) we are all slaves- vs. 1-3.

“Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world.”

  1. Even so, speaks to verse one and two, whereas Paul calls the Galatians who wanted to go back under the law, children.
  • Children mean spiritually immature
  1. Children are under guardians and steward even though they own the house, but they are no different from slaves because they cannot possess what’s theirs until they grow up.
  • Immature people don’t understand their freedom and fellowship with Christ.
  1. We were all slaves to sin and Satan until Jesus Christ's first advent we called it Christmas.
  • Christmas is about our Liberator who came and set us free
 
  1. Christmas is God’s shopping spree for souls- vs. 4.

“But when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law.”

The fullness of the time is the appointed time by the Father!
 
  1. The Purchaser had to meet some prerequisites to purchase a soul.
  • He had to be qualified for the purchase.
  1. God sent forth his Son, Jesus, the only qualified shopper.
  • The Incarnation is the God becoming flesh.
  1. The Son had to be human and divine a hypostatic union.
  • John 1:14, “And the Word was made flesh and dwell among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.”
  1. The Son had to be under the law to fulfill the law.
  • Rom. 10:4, “For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth.”
  • Matthew 5:17, “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets, I am not come to destroy but to fulfill.”
God had to become man to save man, Jesus had to be born a Jew under the law to save them that were in bondage of the law.

Christmas is God doing all that just for me and you!

 
  1. Christmas (Christ) is God’s purchaser- vs. 5.

“To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.”

  1. Christmas is about God buying back what was lost in the Garden of Eden.
  2. Christmas is about God’s gift to the world, that in return would pay the price for souls.
  3. Salvation is free to us, but it cost God His Son’s life.
  • We can’t just stop at the cradle, we must visit the cross of Calvary where the purchase was made.
  • Two things about Jesus’ mission to earth, to redeem and adopt sons and daughters.
Redeem means to purchase back in Hebrew.
Redeem in the Greek is agorazo to purchase in the marketplace,
Exagorazo is to purchase and bring out the marketplace and.
Lutroo is the set free never to be bound again.
 
  1. Christmas (Christ) brings us into sonship/daughter ship and fellowship with God- vs. 5b-7

“That we might receive the adoption of sons, and because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba Father.”

  1. God’s plan for our whole existence is executed by Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem.
  2. Jesus came that we might be adopted into God’s family, as sons and daughters.
  • Adoption is special because the person who is making you his child chooses to do so.
  • Not only did Christ bring me out of darkness but he brought me into his family
  • No longer a servant but an heir of God
  1. Jesus lives in my heart, therefore I am crying “Abba Father”