Galatians 4:28 Commentary

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Galatians 4:28

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The apostle links all believers, both Jews and Gentiles, back to Isaac whom God made to be a figure of all the children of promise. Do we then find in this early event in Genesis a picture of the new birth? According to Paul, we certainly do. There is a natural birth and there is a birth by promise. In the case of Isaac it was a physical birth that was by promise; for us, it is a spiritual birth that is by promise. God showed Israel how he works by illustrating the new birth in the physical realm which was within their experience, so that they could understand what happens in the spiritual realm which was beyond their experience. Therefore the promise was related to Abraham’s physical child, but the circumstances of that child’s birth – Abraham and Sarah’s extreme age – were so arranged by the Lord that it could not take place except as a result of promise. The physical birth of that promised child was to be a picture of the birth which is from above in the case of all those who would believe in the ages to come. Therefore it is a great mistake for some to teach that salvation comes by physical birth and that the children of believers possess some form of spiritual life even without faith of their own. When those who believe in infant baptism and infant regeneration say, ‘Give us a verse in the New Testament that states that the children of God’s people are no longer in the covenant’, we answer, ‘They never were in the covenant. The arrangement by which Abraham’s descendants were blessed never gave them salvation, for the physical seed of Abraham belonged to the illustrative, typical side of that covenant while the saving side of it was always reserved only for those who had faith. Even in the case of Isaac there was no life without his personal faith. He too needed to believe in God and to receive the new birth. How then can some think that physical birth conveys some special benefit when it did not even do so in Isaac’s case? The promise of the physical birth of a son only ever took place in the case of Abraham. Sarah’s barrenness and the situation in which it seemed impossible that she and Abraham could ever have a child were the stage on which God placed them as actors to set this never to be repeated picture before the world for all to learn from. The benefit was in the picture that this gave to the world, but the rule for the church is this: ‘But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God’ (John 1:12-13), and this has always been the only way in which any become the true children of God.

Application

Like Isaac we were promised to Abraham and each one of us is part of that number that would be as the stars of heaven. If we are children of promise, we are children given by God who would never have existed without his supernatural provision, and we are all heirs with Abraham of his inheritance. Abraham was given Canaan, but much more he was given heaven of which Canaan was a figure, though in fact he did not personally inherit the land during his lifetime apart from a very small plot for burial (Hebrews 11:13, 39). But he was also given an exceeding great reward, God himself. We too are children that have come into existence as a result of promise, when no children might have been expected, for who could have thought that those who were born in sin and whose father was the devil, should become children of the most high God?

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Galatians 4:28 Commentary and Bible Study