God Sent His Son
Published by Stanley Pouw in 2023 · 10 December 2023
As we think about the birth of our Lord, draw your attention to the Galatians 4. There is a key verse there that we should dwell on for our time this evening as we look at the Word of God. Let me read Galatians 4:1-7, “Now I say that as long as the heir is a child, he differs in no way from a slave, though he is the owner of everything. 2 Instead, he is under guardians and trustees until the time set by his father.”
3 We also, when we were children were in slavery under the world. 4 When the time came to completion, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. 6 And because you are sons, God sent the Holy Spirit into our hearts, crying, “Abba, Father!” 7 So you are no longer a slave but a son, and then God has made you an heir.”
Let us focus on verse 4, “When the fullness of time came to completion, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law.” That phrase “the fullness of time” marks out the reality that God had established a set time for the sending of His Son. So when we ask the question, “When did Christmas begin?” It did not begin with the virgin conception, it began all the way back in the book of Genesis.
We have to go back to Genesis to see the promise that is fulfilled in the coming of the Son of God. Now we all know that in Genesis 1 we have a record of God’s creation. God the eternal Father, Almighty, the triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, creates the universe and everything in it, and He does it in six days. And on the sixth day was the creation of man, made in God’s image.
In Genesis 2, we focus in on the creation of man and the addition of woman. God gives us details of His bringing man into existence and then bringing woman into existence, and then giving them dominion over the entire creation and all the resources found in it. We also see in Genesis 2 that man and woman had a relationship with God. They were really the children of God.
And then you come to Genesis 3. This is the most horrible chapter describing the most horrible thing with the most long-range impact of this event ever happened since the creation, and that is the fall of men. Satan who fell first along with some of the angels came down to the garden, seduced Eve; and Adam and Eve sinned and rebelled. As a result, the entire creation was cursed.
The impact of sin in the world touched every molecule. Everything began to die. They were distrustful of God and trusted the words of Satan. They disobeyed God’s simple command and plunged the entire human race and all creation into a cursed and dying condition. Everything was corrupted, everything was doomed to destruction, and the whole process of human life is defined by death.
And in the future, the entire universe will be destroyed and replaced with a new heaven and a new earth. The fall led to the curse on the woman, a curse on the serpent, a curse on the man. Let us read Genesis 3:14, 15 and 16, “So the Lord God said to the serpent: Because you have done this, you are cursed more than any livestock and more than any wild animal. You will move on your belly.”
“And eat dust all the days of your life. 15 I will put hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will strike your head, and you will strike his heel. 16 He said to the woman: I will intensify your labor pains; you will bear children with painful effort. Your desire will be for your husband, and yet he will rule over you.”
And then the curse on the man, verse 17: “Cursed is the ground because of you; in toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it shall grow for you; and you will eat the plants of the field; by the sweat of your face you will eat bread, till you return to the ground, because from it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.’”
In that curse is the promise that is fulfilled at Christmas. In verse 15, God says to the serpent, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise Him on the heel.” This is so much the heart of God, with so much love and mercy, that He cannot finish the curse without stating the promise of redemption.
The promise in the midst of the curse of a child who will be that the seed of the woman will crush the serpent’s head. He will be the one to destroy the destroyer, and He will be of the seed of the woman. This speaks of paradise restored and regained. The Lord gives this promise before He even finishes the curse. The Lord gives this promise before He even clothes Adam and Eve.
The Lord gives this promise before He even banishes them from the garden permanently; He sets the cherubim and a flaming sword to make sure they never come back. They have entered into a condition of alienation from God. They were created in the image of God; they were bearers of His image; they communed with God in pure fellowship as a loving Father. That has all ended.
They have gone from being sons of God to being sons of Satan, they have gone from being in paradise to being out of paradise, and the world around them is devastated with sin. Snakes throughout all of human history all over the world, are symbols of and reminders of the curse. Snakes depict the devil. Leviticus 11:42 says, “Anything that crawls on its belly is detestable.”
In a sense, it’s the opposite of a rainbow. Every rainbow is testimony to the fact that God made a promise never to destroy the world again by water. This also defines the life of snakes, is a testimony to God’s promise to destroy Satan. He is destroyed in the plan of God. In fact, the apostle Paul says, “Even now he is under your feet.” Snakes are symbols of the degradation and the defeat of the devil.
Children of the devil or children of God, those are the only two options. Children of the devil are identified here as Satan’s seed, children of God are identified here as the seed of Eve, which also is evidence of Eve’s salvation. She is the mother, symbolically speaking and literally speaking, of all who would ever come into the world, because she’s the only woman; she started the human race with Adam.
And the children of Satan and the children of Eve or salvation will be in conflict. That is what the word “enmity” means. So human history is marked by the righteous in conflict with the unrighteous, the children of the devil with the children of God. But the conflict then focuses on one individual, because it says, “He shall bruise you on the head.” That is the promise of the coming King.
This is an incredible promise. And for many hundreds of years, this was the only gospel there was. The promise that there would come One who would crush Satan, who would end the seducer’s impact, who would bring back paradise and restore people to be sons of God. That was all the gospel there was for centuries, and it would come through the seed of the woman.
Now it would not be without suffering, because Satan, it says, would bruise him on the heel. So the One who crushes Satan would Himself be wounded by Satan. So there in that promise embedded in the curse is the greatest pledge ever given to the human race. Hope, mercy, forgiveness and restoration are all bound up in it. This is where the Christmas story began with a promise embedded in a curse.
We learn later in Genesis 12 and then in Genesis 22:18, as God speaks to Abraham, that the seed who would crush the serpent’s head would come through Abraham, that He would be a member of Abraham’s family, He would be a descendant of Abraham. In Genesis 22:18, God speaks to Abraham, “In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed.” Then God ratified that in Genesis 15.
Abraham had to cut some animals in half and put them apart so there was a path between them, put a dead bird on each side wide, because that’s symbolically in the ancient world how they cut a covenant. Usually two people would pass through the pieces. But in the case of Genesis 15, God anesthetizes Abraham and he falls asleep, and God goes through alone. He’s making a promise with Himself.
We learn later that the seed will come through the line of King David. Let us read 2 Samuel 7:12, God says, “When your days are complete and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your seed after you, who will come forth from you, and I will establish His kingdom.” This is not Solomon, because verse 13 says, “He shall build a house for My name, and I will establish the throne of His kingdom forever.”
God talks about the greater son of David, who would be the Messiah. In Deuteronomy 18 we learn that the seed will be a preacher, a preacher like Moses. Isaiah gives us two prophecies in 2 Samuel 7:14, “Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son, and she will call His name Immanuel, which means God with us.”
Then in Isaiah 9:6, there is another prophecy about this child, “For a Child will be born for us, a Son will be given to us, and the government will be on His shoulders. He will be named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, and Prince of Peace.” The government means the supreme rule of everything. There will be no end to the increase of His government of peace.
Psalm 89:3-4, “The Lord said, “I have made a covenant with my chosen one; I have sworn an oath to David my servant: 4 ‘I will establish your offspring forever.” The son of David who is the true King, the Son of God, is forever established on a throne that has no end. He is called again in verse 27, “I will also make Him my firstborn, the greatest of the kings of the earth.”
So who is this seed? Paul gives us the answer in Galatians 3:16, “Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. He does not say “and to seeds,” as though referring to many, but referring to one, and to your seed, who is Jesus Christ.” The one who fulfilled all of God’s promise. This is the one who will establish an everlasting kingdom of righteousness. It is the Messiah.
Matthew 1:1 says, “An account of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, and the son of Abraham.” Verse 16: “And Jacob fathered Joseph the husband of Mary, who gave birth to Jesus who is called the Messiah.” So Matthew 1:18 says, “The birth of Jesus Christ came about this way: After his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, it was discovered that she was pregnant from the Holy Spirit.
19 So her husband, Joseph, being a righteous man. And not wanting to disgrace her publicly, decided to divorce her secretly. 20 But after he had considered these things, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, don’t be afraid to take Mary as your wife, because what has been conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.
21 She will give birth to a son, and you are to name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” It is none other than Jesus. This is the one who fulfills all God’s promise of paradise regained, restored, of the crushing of Satan and the rescue of men and women, and restoration to becoming sons of God. And this became the message the apostles preached. Look at Acts 13.
The Law couldn’t free you from sin, from death, and from hell. So the message of the apostles was that the promise that God made to the forefathers way back in the book of Genesis was fulfilled in Jesus. How does His salvation come to me as a sinner? Galatians 3:26, “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus,” not because you are worthy, but by faith in Christ.
God didn’t create His Son, He sent Him; He preexisted eternally: born of a woman, full humanity; sent by God, full deity. And why does He come? To redeem us. How did He redeem us? He died on the cross, took the curse that we deserved, redeemed us from the curse, in order that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the nations, so that we would receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.”
For us who have put our faith in Christ, paradise has been regained. We are citizens of heaven: our inheritance is there, our Father is there, our family is there. We are, again, bearers of God’s image. We are children of God. We were the children of Satan, under bondage to the Law and to sin, which led to hell. But by putting our trust in Him, we have become children of God. Let us pray.