Galatians 4:4–5

With "the fullness of time" all is changed. Did it not come when man had fully shown the evil of his heart, and had failed completely to meet his responsibilities? It was proved that "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God," and that all was over on man's side. Then God acted in pure sovereign grace and sent forth His Son, come of a woman, come under law.

God had chosen the exact time to send forth His Son, and He prepared everything for it... God allowed the Romans to have a strong government. They controlled all that part of the world, with Palestine at its centre. They made good roads and kept a great deal of order. This made it possible to preach the gospel in very many places. God had also arranged that all that part of the world should understand Greek. That helped greatly in spreading the good news.

So it is worth noticing that this passage uses exactly the same expression of the Holy Spirit. We read, "God sent forth the Spirit of His Son." No one would dare to argue that this means the Holy Spirit was not sent forth from heaven, or that the words only apply after He had come to earth. Is it not plain, to anyone who submits to God's word, that the Holy Spirit "sent forth" from heaven was the Spirit before He came? In the same way, does not this passage prove that the Son was sent forth from heaven, and was the Son before He became Man?

It is very significant that the letters of the New Testament never speak of the virgin birth, except in Galatians 4:4. There we are told the Lord was "made of a woman." This expression would have been meaningless if it only referred to the way that all children come into the world. "Made of a woman" surely limits the human parentage of our Lord to the mother's side. It is the affirmation of the virgin birth.

The virgin birth means that the Lord Jesus, while truly Man, was yet a Man of a new order.

The Lord Jesus came "made of a woman" — that is, really and truly Man. He came "made under the law" — that is, born of Israel, the chosen people, whom God had placed under the law's rule. He came under the law — but not to keep it for us, and not to atone that way for our failure to keep it. He came to redeem those who were under it.

Besides, He magnified the law and made it honourable — and that carries real moral weight. It mattered to honour the law, the measure of what God requires from His creature. And it mattered just then, when He was about to take man out from under it altogether and set him free from it.

But was God's business done when the Son was here, come of a woman, come under the law? By no means. His coming as Man was only the means, not the end. Redemption was the great point to which God turned. So the Son was sent, and came "to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons."

It is true that then the fullness of the time had come for God to send forth His Son. The very children were enslaved under the basic principles of the world, and all were shut up under sin. Man had proved that he could ruin himself under the law of God, and all the more easily because the law was good and he was bad. But was God's business done when the Son was here, come of a woman, come under the law? Not at all. The Incarnation was only the means, not the end. Redemption was the great point to which God turned.

That law was no bondage for Him. He fully worked out the righteousness of the law. Yet His righteous and holy life could not redeem those under the law. Redemption from the curse of the law was accomplished in the death of the cross.

The word here may go a little further. Yet it is not properly "redeem," but buying up or retrieving, as in Galatians 3:13 and Galatians 4:5. It is not the state of deliverance we enjoy, though that is the result for the believer. The point is that Christ bought out from under the law those once under it, to make them His own.

By death, then, we are redeemed from the curse of the law. Galatians 4:5, however, carries us a step further. We are redeemed not only from the law's curse but also from its rule. In receiving the "adoption of sons," we are set free from the schoolmaster's rule and from the schoolroom routine. We leave the schoolroom for the freedom of the grown-up son. He knows his father's mind, and he moves without restriction in every room of the house.

The result of redemption is "that we might receive sonship." Here again, the "we" is Jewish and Gentile believers brought into a position of sonship, or "adopted" to be sons. Sonship is a word not often used. It is the contrast to the picture before it: the child who is like an infant, kept under the law, in a position of immaturity... Adopted to be sons means to be placed in a position of sonship, and that goes with maturity and with dignity. It is a wonderful position — not under the law, as under a jailer or a tutor. It is a place of dignity in God's presence, and it includes fellowship with God.

He came to redeem those that were under the law, so that believers (whoever they may be) should receive the adoption. The sending of the Spirit proved that Gentile believers now shared that adoption, for the Spirit made them cry, "Abba, Father"... The Gentile was a stranger to the house. The Jew, while under age, was no different from a servant. Yet each had now taken the position of a son in direct relation with the Father. The Holy Spirit was the power and the witness of that relation. All this came from the redemption the Son carried out on their behalf. The Jew under the law needed it as much as the Gentile in his sins.