MOUNT SINAI… JERUSALEM …THE MOTHER OF US ALL

The legalists had arrived and spread their insidious and diabolic doctrine throughout Galatia. Christ plus Moses! Christ plus the law! Christ plus ritual! With paternal yearnings and pastoral wisdom, Paul addressed the doctrinal error with uncompromis­ing language and with unimpeachable scriptural logic.

He has argued from the history of faith as a principle of bless­ing, 2. 1-14, the purpose of the law, 3. 19-25, and the principle of sonship and heirship, 4. 1-10. In our reading today, he employs allegory to drive home the lesson he would convey. An allegory is a historical fact which contains within it not a foreign and unrelated substance but a deeper lesson.

Two mothers, two mountains, and two means are used to teach this allegorical lesson. Paul dips into Jewish history, a heri­tage which each Jew held dear, and uses a well-known story to illustrate his point. The bondwoman, Hagar, and the free woman, Sarah, although not mentioned directly, each bore a son. The one son, Ishmael, was born according to the natural principles of generation. As such, he was born after the flesh, v. 23. The son of the free woman, Isaac, was born according to promise by divine power.

The lesson is then applied. Hagar is representative of Mount Sinai and the covenant of law. This answers to Jerusalem which is still under the bondage of the law. ‘Jerusalem which is above’ is referred to as the ‘mother of us all’, v. 26, and is the covenant of grace. Guided by the Spirit of God, Paul then speaks of how we in this day of grace are, like Isaac, children of promise. With con­summate skill, he next employs a verse which the Jews would have used to boast in their superiority and special relationship with God, ‘Cast out the bondwoman’, and turns it against the law-teachers. In the flow of his argument, the bondwoman, her son, and the principle they represent, the law, must give way before the children of promise and the new covenant. Grace has triumphed and the people of God have been brought into the blessedness of freedom through the work of our Lord Jesus Christ.