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Bro. Otis Fisher
Galatians, the fourth chapter and the first verse,
Paul is still speaking, we're still listening to him.
Now I say that the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing
from the servant, though he be Lord of all.
Last week I gave you an idea on which I'd like for you to write,
and that was namely this.
As you look at the entire Bible, from the Genesis 1 to Revelation last,
and you look at the way that it is laid out, we begin with a
creation.
This answers to the conception and birth of a child.
Then we have the garden and man put in the garden.
This would answer to the innocence of a child.
I want you to go through the entire Bible in that method, looking to see how
the very construction or canonization of the Bible depicts that of a man,
from birth to death.
Write down whatever you can think of as you study, it'll take you some time, I'm not expecting that
before Christmas, so it'll give you plenty of time to write,
and I think it will surprise all of us how even the layout of the Bible teaches us something.
Then I had another question.
How many of you found scripture where absolutely without a doubt it tells you that angels sing?
You didn't find it?
I know some of you looked extremely hard.
You didn't find it, did you?
No one?
I think it said beasts, didn't it?
Living creatures.
What did you find as you looked for angels singing?
What did you find as far as the angels?
When they announced the birth of Christ, didn't they sing?
That's right, there is no place in the Bible that it tells us the angels sing.
Now I don't mean to burst your bubble, but it's highly possible
that's true.
Just a side point, there's so many, many, many things, and David and I have talked about writing a book on
what the Bible does not say.
We've grown up with phrases and sayings and everything that
we have considered to be gospel when they're not.
Now the heir, as long as he is a child,
does not differ from a servant.
So, as the parents raise the child, it's an extremely,
extremely important phase, not just for the child, but for the parents.
I found a very interesting story, a true
story, and let me read it to you because it points out a very interesting fact.
Dr. Hitchcock of Sandwich, England, this was back in the 1700s,
late 1700s.
He needed to go to the little village of Plymouth, England.
Walking was the only method of travel that he could afford, so he began.
It was but a short walk of about an hour and a half.
That is, if he didn't get lost, and there was a strong possibility that he might get lost.
As he was approaching some very, very dense woods, the path that he
was following disappeared into those woods.
And to be sure that he was on the right path, he saw an elderly woman in her yard
hanging up close.
So he approached her very cautiously and inquired if she might direct him
to the little village of Plymouth.
She said, well, certainly, sir.
You continue right on this path just as you're going until you come
into the woods quite some way, and at that point you will
find four or five paths that seemingly cross and take off from this one.
What you do is consider all of them and take the one that you
consider to be the best suited to you.
He did that and he arrived at Plymouth in the shortest possible means.
Now what does that tell us?
First of all, I think it's important
that we can learn from this story
to follow our good instincts.
I'm talking to Christians.
Listen to the Holy Spirit as he guides us, and if we do that, we'll raise
our family the very possible way that is available.
The key to it is to have good common sense.
The greater key is to have this good common sense.
Lots of people don't have good common sense.
But the good common sense is a gift from God also.
Now verse 2, this heir, as long as he is a child, is
under tutors and governors until the time appointed of the father.
All events are according to the father.
They are set from infinity past.
Here we find God the father has set a time in time.
He's reached down into time and has set a time even though he himself
is not in time and he remains outside of it.
Now why did he do this?
Why did he set a time for the coming of our Lord?
Why did he set a time for the finish of the law?
Why did he set a time for the beginning of the law?
Dennis, what do you think?
The time is for us?
Yes.
He set times even though he himself is not in time.
Don't let that confuse you.
My question is why was there a time set for any event?
Anyone else?
All right.
But the time was set long before there was scripture.
Certainly, the scripture come along and pointed out the fact and that he
was in control.
Bill, what's the purpose of time?
We could not exist without time?
Could we not exist unless we're like we are?
Then we are what we are because we live in time.
You'd have made a good lawyer, Bill.
Turn to Matthew 11, 26.
He gives the answer for all of this.
Very outstanding statement.
Matthew 11, 26.
I want you all to notice that we have Greg on the front row again.
Greg, read to us Matthew 11, 26.
Is there a better answer?
We try to get too analytical sometimes.
Bill is exactly right in that we would have a most difficult time functioning without time.
I've always thought of time as that which keeps everything from happening at the same time.
Some of you are slower than others, I guess.
I was thinking how much time do we have to have all that information at once?
That's right.
Certainly, it's the only one.
Now go to Ephesians 1, 11.
And Greg, you read that when you arrive.
Don't ever forget that scripture reference.
Ephesians 1, 11 must always be read with Romans 8,
28, who worketh all things after the counsel
of his own will.
This is what completes the reference in Romans that all things
work together.
He's the one that's working them.
That's why they all work together.
Verse 3, even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world.
Now, when I first read this years ago, I was very confused on this elements of the world.
But it's really rather simple.
Now, if you can think like a Jew at that time, not
that that's simple, but it was simple for them, Paul has in mind here the
character of the law, the foundation, the beginning of the law,
the elements of the law, as it applies to both the Jews
and Gentiles, to all knowledge of the world, the cosmos is the only orderly material
in existence.
This phrase elements of the world was a Jewish phrase and it
simply meant the law, all of the elements of the law.
And they were certainly subject to the elements of the law until something else
come along and we'll see that in a moment.
The rudiments of the principles of the Jewish religion.
Now this morning I want to have a little demonstration and I want
to, well, Greg,
you're up here, you'll suffice.
Come up here.
We have here a Webster's New World Dictionary.
Now, would you agree that the words to the New Testament are in there?
All right, open it and read something from Romans.
Very slow.
Why?
Do you see how this represents the law?
Everything was there for the gospel, but we could not read it or understand until it was
put into words and phrases that we understand.
The gospel's not new, it's in the Old Testament and every word of it's in that book.
So this is like the law.
Now they could understand the part that was meant for them to understand.
They knew there was something else.
The writers several times mentioned that there was a mystery that was
hidden.
Well, the church was in the Old Testament, but it was hidden.
In the New Testament it's revealed.
Same words, same spelling, everything, but it's put
together different.
The law and the gospel.
The gospel was in the law, but you could not understand it.
Any questions?
Now you know the difference between the gospel and the law.
The apostle intimates that the law was not the science of salvation.
Could you be saved by the law?
Can you be saved by the law?
So it was not the science of salvation, was it?
What was it?
Why did the law come?
How did it do that?
It showed up.
Then are you saying that man did not know that he was sinning until he saw the law that
told him that?
I think so too.
The law come along so that we would know that there was a need for salvation.
There was a need for something else that was not available in the law.
So we have the elements of the gospel or the alphabet of the gospel, if you please,
in the law.
Fourth verse, but when the fullness of time was come, there's another reference to time.
God sent forth his son, made of a woman, made under the law.
Now, please remember, while Jesus was here on earth, he was operating under
the law, not the gospel.
Made under the law.
But when the fullness of time, let's talk about that for a little bit.
Fullness of time, God sent forth his son, made of a woman, made under the law.
In this one verse, he utters many, many things.
The first thing that you see when the fullness of time was
gone, God sent forth his son.
What's the very first thing that you see?
Mary was pregnant and she was about to deliver a child.
All right, that's true.
Has anybody seen?
It was also in God's plan for it to occur at that time.
I think these are all the promises in the Old Testament.
So, not only the nine months, but everything up including
the nine months, the birth.
So, the fullness of time, something cannot be full until it is full, can it?
So, something is not finished until it's complete.
So, everything up to this point now is complete, finished.
The law was completed.
Does it say anything to the fact that we're not sons by nature?
He sent forth his son.
We might be brothers.
He took on him the flesh that we have, the same flesh,
but it was different than us.
Dian, in what way could you, in a very few words, sum up the difference
between Jesus and you and I?
He is perfect and we're not.
What great difference, Russell, is there between Jesus when
he walked here on earth and you and I?
Trudy?
All right, so he was God -man.
I don't believe Russell would fit that category.
None of us would.
Jesus come as Adam did, innocent.
Adam chose to sin, Jesus chose not to.
Jesus never took on the sin nature.
Adam did.
The maid of a woman tells us that he was human,
but as Trudy pointed out, he's also God.
Now, Verge, we know that statement.
We've heard that phrase forever, that Jesus was God -man,
Jesus the Christ.
But I would defy you to explain that term where I can really understand it.
How could a man be God?
Can you?
Can you explain?
I don't think anybody can.
You know, he has told us that the just shall live by faith.
There is no other way to live.
He has made that gulf in between our complete knowledge and what we have here,
and it has to be bridged by faith.
There's just no other way that you can do it.
You can study forever, and you'll still have to use faith.
We're noticing that text, though, it was not for faith.
We've got to have it, not faith in it.
And he regulates as to who receives the faith.
The time is said to be full when all parts are passed and ended.
Therefore, Christ could not have come sooner or later, because
all of the parts had to be completed in God's timetable.
Even though he's out of time, he functions in time.
His son came immediately from God himself, made of a
woman according to the promise.
So he did this to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the
adoption of sons, that we might be adopted into the
family of God, and that we would be
sons with his son to redeem them.
Since it was them that sinned, then it had to be them that the
remedy applied to.
Now, the entire creation was under a curse, was it not?
Is it not?
The entire, all that man's ever seen and everything he has not seen is operating under
a curse.
In fact, it's less than perfect.
And it's due to what?
Roger, what has put all of this creation in a lower state than sin?
Was it the sin of the creation?
It was the sin of man.
Then why is the creation cursed?
All right, but could he not have left it perfect?
The effects of it is getting close.
Bill?
Think for a moment if fallen man had been left in a perfect environment.
Now, don't misunderstand Bill when he said he had to do something.
There was nothing to surprise God.
It had already been planned.
And that's what Bill meant.
Sure, absolutely.
So the faith will not be needed when we're in eternity.
But it is now.
And that's a good point.
Sure, man's made to work.
And by made to work, I mean he's put together in a fashion that it calls for work.
If you work hard all your life looking toward retirement, unless you have looked
beyond retirement, you'll possibly die within three months.
Don't do that.
You start something now that you really, really enjoy doing.
A hobby, whatever.
Because by the time you retire, it could be a full -time business.
I know from experience.
I know from watching my father.
He had nothing.
And he was dead in a very short time.
Man's supposed to work.
Work just as long as you possibly can.
Go to Romans 8 20.
And Greg, I'd like for you to read 8 20, 21, 22, and 23.
Creation was made to be fallen by
God.
Verse six, and because you are sons, God has sent forth the spirit of his son
into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.
Now, I have a demonstration this morning I've never used before,
but I couldn't get it out of my mind.
And I don't know if you all can see that hand back that far or not.
Okay.
We have the works of a clock with this pendulum.
Now it says the indwelling Holy Spirit.
My words now, the Holy Spirit is a feedback control
to control how much we
comprehend of the Holy truth without the Holy Spirit, you would
run wild without the indwelling Holy Spirit.
We would get too much or too little of understanding.
The Holy Spirit is what interprets is what reveals is what teaches
the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is like a governor.
You understand the words of a governor, not political office, but
that that regulates the speed.
It's not going to run very long because it's on level, but it'll do to show my purpose.
Now, the pendulum is equal to the Holy Spirit.
Verge is letting that hand move only a certain amount in a certain length of time.
It's regulated.
That's the way the Holy Spirit works in our life.
Very silently, but he teaches us that which we need to know when we need to know it.
Now we have to study.
It's not going to happen without it.
But without the Holy Spirit, let me show you something.
Not exactly.
Now, without the Holy Spirit, our
clock is wound one time.
He wound this clock once.
Our life representing the clock
is wound one time when it runs down is the length of our
life without the Holy Spirit.
As a governor, as a control that would possibly run down within five
minutes, five minutes in a ratio of, say, 80
years, Bill would be what length of time
would the five minutes be the same as none.
So the purpose of the Holy Spirit in our life is not only to keep us alive,
to keep us ticking, but to regulate as to what speed we go.
The hand shows where we are in life.
The last hour, the first hour, the sixth hour,
middle age, whatever.
And its purpose is to show us God to regulate our life so
that we learn constantly all of the time, but only that
which we need and comprehend.
And the length of the pendulum is the one that does it.
Man has nothing to do with that part.
And when it runs down, you graduate.
All right, we have just a few minutes now.
Are there any questions from anybody?
Absolutely.
Without the Holy Spirit, it'd be almost like without time.
That's a good observation.
Just think, if you get the entire lifetime of influence of the Holy Spirit crowded down all
within one minute, what would you, you'd explode.
You just could not handle it.
Any other comment, observation, question, argument?
This may be for a lad.
On the computer the other day, I was looking at clocks, and forever there
have been various kinds of doomsday clocks that tell you when a certain thing will
be over and so forth.
Well, this one had to do with the human life.
And all you had to do was to put in your birth date
and whether you were male or female.
And then you can press the button to see how much time you have left on Earth.
I put in my birthday, and I was male, and I pressed the button, and it
says, oops, you left us on November
the 20th, 1996.
I hope you had a nice trip.
If you have, we'll all be together in eternity.
And if you haven't, we didn't want to know you anyway.
That's good fruit.
I think.
Anything else?
That we got a reference to a man who says, even if the
son of man came not to
minister unto them, but to minister and to give his life as a
ransom for many.
He didn't say all, just like he didn't say, he said them and we,
and he didn't add all there either.
I think it's so good that you're all are learning to pay attention to the little words.
The little words teach doctrine.
Many is certainly different than all.
Bless Dan and Greg, would you dismiss this please?
I know he had this problem.