At Just the Right Time

At Just the Right Time
Sermon on Galatians 4:4
Third Wednesday in Advent
Our Hope Lutheran Church
17 December 2025

Text: But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law. (Ga 4:4).

Time is a funny thing. We use clocks that measure the vibrations of atoms, coordinated with telescopes to record their passage with great precision and consistency from place to place, transmit them to us via computers, satellites, radio, television, and other digital signals, and synchronise our clocks with them. We barely notice that time is a human thing — except on leap years or when we change our clocks twice a year or move from time zone to time zone.

Time is how we record the changes we notice more and more each year of life. Time passes quickly. When you are a child, an hour drags on forever. As an adult, it passes before you realise it. What is important, our culture has noticed, is not time itself, but what you do with it. It has become our new currency. We would sooner write a check than hang out.

The Greek of the New Testament uses two different words for time. καιρός (kairos) translates roughly “the right time.” χρόνος (Chronos) is about the passage of time, minute after minute, hour after hour, year after year. Seasons like Advent, days like Christmas and New Year’s Day are χρόνος, times that we plan for, come and go, forming a part of the rhythm of life. That Christmas when you opened your first present is καιρός

These Advent Wednesdays, we’ve touched on the descent of Jesus. Pastor looked at the Son of Abraham, Seminarian Joe looked at the Son of David. Tonight, we look at Son of the Woman — two women, actually. Eve, the mother of us all, and Mary of Nazareth. These women represent particular right times — the first gospel promise to Eve and its fulfilment, and all the promises of God to save the world, when the Word became flesh in the womb of Mary.

The fullness of time when God sent his son, born of a virgin, is God’s καιρός (Galatians 4:4-5). His acts and plans unfolded slowly, one building on another, leading to just that right time. The next big καιρός is the Second Advent, when time itself will come to an end in God’s eternal life with his people.

Time began when God created the world in six days, concluding it with making man in his own image, creating him in his own image. He formed Adam from the dust of the ground and breathed life into him, and then made Eve from his side. As he rested on the first Sabbath Day, he looked at it all, and it was very good.

When Adam and Eve ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge, they brought sin, suffering, grief and death into the world. But God still loved us, even loved us before he made the world. Even while placing the curse on Eve, he had already set in motion his plan to save us.  The sons of the serpent would bruise the heel of her Seed, the Son of the Woman, and that Son of hers would crush his head. 

One son of Eve, faithful to God’s promises, built an Ark. Through this son, God saved eight souls and the animals of his creation. Now it would be a son of Eve, a son of Noah, Abraham, through whom he would bless the world. But not just any son whom he loved, but a Son of Sarah.

Later, a son of Abraham and Sarah had mercy on his widowed sister-in-law, Ruth, and married her. Boaz and Ruth’s son, David, would be King of Israel, and God promised one of his sons would be the Messiah.

David, though a man after God’s own heart, was promised that one of his sons would sit on his throne forever. After repenting of his sins, God gave David and Bathsheba a son, Solomon, through whom God would keep his promise.

As the years flew by, God sent one prophet after another, calling his people to repentance and promising the coming of yet one more son of a woman to come to redeem his people from their slavery to sin and death. He shaped kings and kingdoms, put in place one condition after another, so that the times were just correct for his son to become flesh and live among us, born of a virgin.

God had become one of us. He perfectly obeyed the law we disobeyed, bore our sins to the cross, where he paid the price of our sin for us. Having died for us, he rose again to break the seal of the grave forever and ascended to the throne of God, where today he prays for us.

Now, when we are baptised, he places his name on us, adopting us as heirs of our Heavenly Father, so that now we can call him our Father. When our Chronos runs out, and our Kairos comes, he will welcome us home and dry every tear in our eyes. We will wait with him for one more Kairos, when we will return with him to make all things new.

On that day, he will call our bodies from their graves, unite them with our souls, and transform them into glorious bodies, fit for eternity. Then we will go with him and all his saints to the new heavens and new earth, where we will shine like the sun in the joy of our heavenly Father. At that last Kairos, he will say it again: “It is very good!”

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

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