 The title of our sermon this morning is Behold What Manor of Love. Behold What Manor of Love, our primary text Galatians chapter 3. We'll look at several texts this morning. Considering John, it's where our title comes from, the Apostle John, the Apostle John was in constant amazement over the love of God toward him. John amazed that the Lord Jesus Christ loved him. He referred to himself in the Gospel of John as the disciple whom Jesus loved. That's not because John was prideful in saying that as if God didn't love the other disciples. The Lord didn't love the other disciples. It's because John in humility was amazed with the fact that Jesus Christ loved him personally. And if you are in Christ through faith, then you are one whom Jesus Christ loves. And that should amaze us. It should cause us to worship and praise him and wonder that the Lord Jesus Christ could love us. The title of our sermon this morning comes from the words of the beloved apostle in 1st John chapter 3 verse 1. As he considered that fact in awestruck wonder, the chief of all the blessed benefits that have come to us through the person and work of the Son, that we are loved by God. Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us that we should be called children of God. John was astonished as we should be, right? Once children of the devil, children of our Father the devil, sons of disobedience by nature, children of wrath just like the rest, now the children of God and joint heirs with Christ from the gutter most of the utter most, amen. It is the highest of all the blessings afforded us through the Gospel. It's cliche for many today to say that we're all children of God. Well, that is Hallmark card theology, sappy sentimentalism. You don't get that from the Bible. There is a sense in which God is the Father of creation. Paul says in Acts chapter 17 that we are his offspring. His creation is his offspring, but that's the same sense in which James describes the Father as the Father of the lights in the heavens. God made the world and everything in it. He gives life, breath to all things. He is in that sense, the Father of creation. The closer still to the sense in which we're referring to it, God is the Father of the theocratic nation of Israel. He chose Israel. He brought the physical seat of Abraham into covenant with himself, and that God was very gracious, very merciful. Then Moses declares to Pharaoh, thus says the Lord, Israel is my son. However, we think about that in context. That was the old covenant and now obsolete and replaced by the new. And Paul says they are not all of Israel who are Israel. No, distinct from the way in which God is the Father of creation, distinct from the way in which God is the Father of the old covenant nation of Israel, even distinct from the way in which God is Father in the Trinity within the Godhead, God is Father to new covenant sons and daughters through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And to make this even clearer, the Bible draws a distinction then between those who are sons and daughters through faith and those who die in their sin. Listen to 1 John chapter 3 verse 1 again. Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us that we should be called children of God. Therefore the world, in contrast with the children of God, therefore the world does not know us because it did not know him. Beloved, now we are children of God and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when he is revealed we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is. John is talking to believers, right? In verse 10, in verse 10 John goes on, in this the children of God, those who are sons of God adopted it in his household and the children of the devil are made manifest. Whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is he who does not love his brother. So John draws our attention to two distinct families, two distinct families. You are a child of God adopted into his household or you are a child of your father the devil. The Bible describes your natural condition, your default position as being among the household of the damned. We are born in Adam under the judgment of God's law, born in sin, born citizens of hell. Paul says that we are sons of disobedience. I didn't sneak into your house last night and write that in your Bible. That's all over the Bible and that's God's word, God's testimony to us. We are sons apart from the Lord Jesus Christ, apart from God's one provision for sin. We are sons of disobedience driven out of the garden, cut off from return as it were by a flaming sword of God's judgment. We walk according to the course of this world, according to the Prince of the power of the air. That's all Scripture pertaining to our condition, apart from the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul says we are by nature. Our very DNA as it were is wrapped up in this fact that we are children of wrath, just as the others. As Owen says, we are of that family whose inheritance is wrath. We are of that family whose inheritance is curse and death and hell. Under the power of darkness and of our father the devil, of the family of sin and Satan. We have no right, you or I, no right, no title to any other family. That's our family by birth. That's our family by nature. Least of all, do we have any right to be called children of God? We have no title, no right to that blessed title, that blessed privilege to that heavenly family. We are born aliens, strangers, and enemies. That family, that family belongs to those who are accepted in the beloved. That family belongs to those upon whom the riches of God's grace are lavished, poured out to the everlasting praise of his glory. That family is the family of the saints. That family, those are the sons of the light and sons of the day. The general assembly in church of the firstborn whose names are registered in heaven, as he also says in Hosea, right, it shall come to pass in the place where it was said to them, you are not my people, that there they shall be called sons of the living God. And if sons, then heirs of God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Once sons of darkness now partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. It's a wondrous privilege, a wondrous blessing. How is it, how is it that the sons of God come to such a high and exalted position? How do we get there? How is it, how is it that we are scraped up out of the gutter of our sin and made sons in his household? Unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, unfit for any place in his presence. How is it that we sinners, hellbound, hell-deserving, become children of God from the gutter most to the utter most? John tells us, John tells us in John chapter 1 verse 10, Jesus Christ was in the world, the world was made through him, and the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own did not receive him. But as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in his name, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. God as a free sovereign act of his grace gives us the right, or the power, or the authority. He gives us the title, through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, to those who believe in his name, he gives us the title of sons of God. He declares it to be so. It is a legal act. It's a forensic declaration. It's a change of status that God bestows upon us in love. John Owen says this. It is a judicial exalting us into membership in that family where God is our father, Christ our elder brother, all saints and angels, brethren and fellow children, and the inheritance of crown immortal and incorruptible that fades not away. It's a wondrous truth. We refer to that legal act. We refer to that gracious declaration as adoption. The Bible calls it adoption. Oh, how shall I the goodness tell father, which thou to me has showed that I, a child of wrath and hell, that I should be called a child of God? Amazing, wondrous grace. Our confession of faith, the London Baptist confession of faith of 1689 in chapter 12 and the chapter on adoption says this. All those who are justified, in other words, those who believe in his name, John chapter 1, all those who are justified, God vouchsafed in and for the sake of his only son, Jesus Christ, to make partakers of the grace of adoption. Those that are justified, God vouchsafed. In other words, the word vouchsafed means to grant or to give a right to give a blessing or privilege by favor, by grace, or by condescension. Here, the first statement of our confession, it's for the sake of his beloved son. God gives the privilege or the right to be partakers of the grace of adoption for the sake of his only son, Jesus Christ. That goes on to say that by the grace of adoption, those who are justified are then taken into the number. They enjoy the liberties, the privileges of the children of God. They have his name put upon them. They receive the spirit of adoption, have access to the throne of grace with boldness, are enabled by the spirit to cry, Abba, father, they are pitied, protected, provided for, chastened by him as a father, yet never cast off, but sealed to the day of redemption and will inherit the promise as heirs of everlasting salvation. It's a blessed status to be called children of the living God. Amen. All of this, all of this, our adoption as sons and daughters, a free sovereign act of God's grace. God, our loving and gracious heavenly father, exalts those whom he has justified to a place of sonship with the Lord Jesus Christ himself, such that John can say, as he is, so are we in this world. It's amazing to think about, isn't it? Amazing to think about. Hellbound, hell deserving sinners like us exalted to that kind of a position where we are called in Scripture, sons of the living God. Think with me for a moment about the Gibeonites as an example, as a contrast. Think with me about the Gibeonites. If you remember that account from Joshua chapter 9, Israel, under the leadership of Joshua, absolutely wipes out Jericho, right? Every living thing placed under the ban, Rahab and her family spared, a great victory, a tremendous slaughter. The Israelites then go to AI, and after a bit of a hiccup at AI, AI is also destroyed. Everyone placed under the ban. They've utterly destroyed everything and everyone in those two cities. They've done all of this by the power of God. God has delivered them into their hands. And so the Gibeonites are rightfully terrified. They're on the list. They're going to be going to their town soon, coming to a town near you. Joshua in these Israelites, the Gibeonites are terrified. They know that what became of Jericho, what became of AI, would soon become of them. So out of fear, the Bible says that the Gibeonites worked craftily. They pretended. They pretended to save their hide, right? They took old sacks on their donkeys. They took old clothes on their backs, old sandals on their feet, old and crusty, dry and moldy bread in their satchels, wine and old wineskins. And they went to Joshua in fear and made a covenant with him. Joshua didn't seek the Lord's help, didn't seek the Lord's counsel, and Joshua entered into the covenant with the Gibeonites. The Gibeonites did this knowing, knowing that when they were found out, they would be slaves to Israel. But at least they would escape with their lives. And what happened, they became woodcutters and water carriers for God's covenant people. Cursed as it were for a lifetime of slavery to Israel, not so for an adopted son or daughter of the kingdom. You see the contrast between the two? There is no fear in love. Perfect love casts out fear. They are children. Those adopted sons and daughters of the kingdom are children in the house of their father. They have title, title given them to all the rights, all the privileges, all the blessings of the family to which they have been delivered. The kingdom to which they have been conveyed. Many will say, right? And they'll say it in this fake kind of humility. Just give me an outhouse on the outskirts of heaven and I'll be happy with that. I just want a little tent on the outskirts. No, there's not going to be any tents on the outskirts of heaven. You are a son or a daughter of the kingdom. You're going to inherit with the son. You have a place prepared for you. Your inheritance awaits as he is. So am I. Amazing privilege, amazing blessing. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God, right? But our privilege, our blessedness as sons and daughters adopted in the kingdom is far greater than a mere doorkeeper in heaven. We're treated as adopted sons. Romans chapter 8 verse 15, for you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, Abba, father, when you come face to face with your sin, you are a son, you are a daughter in his household, a child of the king. Face your fear, face your sin in faith. We have received the spirit of adoption and we can cry out Abba, father, the spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of the living God. And if children then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. If indeed we suffer with him that we may also be glorified together. It's a wondrous, glorious thought, a wondrous doctrine, wondrous truth. So we want to spend some time then fleshing out the biblical basis for this doctrine and then close by considering the glorious implications of this doctrine. First, consider with me the biblical basis for the doctrine of adoption under three headings. One, adoption determined by the Father. Two, adoption secured by the Son. Three, blessings of adoption wrought by the Spirit. You see the Trinitarian basis for this doctrine, right? Adoption determined by the Father, secured by the Son, wrought by the Spirit. First, adoption is determined by the Father, turned me to Ephesians chapter one, Ephesians chapter one. Now as you're turning there, the doctrine of adoption is found to be rooted and grounded in the eternal purpose of God for those whom he has chosen in Christ. The purpose of adoption, the doctrine of adoption is rooted and grounded in the eternal, redemptive purposes of God. Look at Ephesians chapter one and look beginning with me at verse three. Paul is writing in Ephesians one, he's writing to the saints in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus. Now by implication is writing to us, right? All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for us. Paul is writing to saints, those who are believing, faithful in Christ Jesus, those who are followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, those who are the beneficiaries of Christ's work. And look at what he says in verse three. Paul says, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. Paul essentially says, listen, blessed be the God who has blessed us with all these blessings. Paul is worshiping the Lord for all his blessings to us. And notice these are spiritual blessings. In other words, they are blessings pertaining to the life of the Spirit. You have the Spirit in dwelling you, these blessings are going to flow from the Spirit's work in you, okay? Blessings pertaining to the life of the Spirit. These are blessings that are applied by the work of the Spirit, namely verse four, our election to holiness and verse five, our adoption as sons. Those are the fountain head blessings that Paul begins with. Look at verse four. Just as he, God, chose us in him in Christ before the foundation of the world so that we should be holy and without blame before him in love. Having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to himself according to the good pleasure of his will to the praise of the glory of his grace by which he made us accepted in the beloved. Now think with me about this text. Let's break it down. God has blessed us with blessings pertaining to the Spirit. Through these blessings, he has connected us as it were to heavenly places in Christ to the age that is to come. He has done all of this in Christ, in other words, by virtue of our union with him through his person and work, just as or because verse four, he chose us in him in Christ before the foundation of the world. There's a causal relationship there. All these spiritual blessings are given to us just as or because he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world. The electing choice of God is determined in eternity, in eternity where God alone existed, in other words, before the existence of anything else, meaning that God chose freely, God chose sovereignly independent of anything in creation, namely independent of anything to do with man. The election of God in eternity was decreed then with a purpose in the mind of God. Look at verse four, the purpose of our election, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love. In other words, what God foresaw was that we were unholy and with blame. We were unholy and blame worthy. So our election then has the purpose of conforming us into the image of his son, to be holy and to be blameless before him in love. Now notice with me verse five, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to himself. In other words, listen, he chose us having predestined us to adoption. He chose the main verb, having predestined is a related verb. It's an arist participle for you Greek guys related to the main verb. In other words, this gives us the ground or the foundation of our election in eternity. In the heart and mind of God the Father as it were, he was determined in his elective purpose in love to adopt us as sons and daughters to himself. Having determined to adopt us to himself in love, God the Father then elects us in Christ to be holy and without blame before him. You see the order that Paul gives us in verses four and five, the connection between verses four and five? Adoption as sons is before, if you will, election to be holy and without blame before him in love. Adoption as sons is a compound word in the Greek weothesia. Weothesia, it means two words, son weothesia from tifemi, meaning to place, placing as a son, placing a son. In other words, pertaining to the placing of a son through adoption. That word is often translated in the scriptures as adoption and that son being adopted is entitled to all the rights, all the privileges, all the blessings belonging to a natural son, including the right to inherit. Now this predestination to adoption, verse five, was according to the good pleasure of his will, verse six, to the praise of the glory of his grace by which he made us accepted in the beloved. His will there, verse five, refers to the plan and decrees of God, what God purposed in time to do, and good pleasure refers to the delight or the joy of God in willing it according to the good pleasure of his will. In other words, it was simply the joy, the delight of God the Father in lavishing riches of his grace upon his people for the sake of his son that forms the basis, the ground or the foundation upon which he then adopts them as sons and daughters by Jesus Christ to himself. It's just the joy and delight of the Father. It wasn't that the Father simply elected to or decreed to elect us. That would have been great. A tremendous blessing. It wasn't just that the Father intended or purpose to forgive us of our sins. That would be wonderful. That's a tremendous blessing. But God for his own good pleasure determined in eternity to adopt to himself wayward children, adopt to himself in Christ sons and daughters that he might for the ages to come pour out upon them the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. As sons and daughters, behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed upon us that we should be called children of God. It's amazing, isn't it? What a blessing. Election to holiness, a tremendous blessing. Redemption through his blood, a staggering gift. Wonders, wonders of his grace, the forgiveness of sins. Amazing. Thank you, Lord. But chief among these spiritual blessings in the heavenly places and at the root of them all is our adoption as sons by our heavenly Father. It's amazing. But now listen, by virtue of our sonship, we have the right to inherit. Look down at verse 11. We have the right to inherit. In him, verse 11, in Christ also we have then obtained an inheritance. We have obtained an heiress indicative past time. We have obtained it. It's been secured for us. It's waiting for us, you could say. There is an already and a not yet aspect to our status as sons and daughters. We've obtained an inheritance. We haven't gone yet to get it, right? But it's waiting there for us. We've obtained it. One day we'll go to receive it. We've obtained that inheritance being predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will so that we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of his glory. In him you also trusted after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation in whom also having believed you were sealed with a holy spirit of promise who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession to the praise of his glory. What a glorious treasure we have in Christ. A glorious privilege, depraved destitute orphans, now sons of the living God. And if sons then heirs and joint heirs with Christ. So our adoption determined by the Father. Secondly, our adoption is secured by the Son. Flip the page to the right and go to or to the left and go to Galatians chapter 3. Galatians chapter 3. In Galatians chapter 3, Paul has been explaining the purpose and use of the law. In chapter 3 verse 24, Paul uses two illustrations to show the authority, the force of the law over unbelievers. Two illustrations. He describes the law as a prison and he describes the law as a tutor. In verse 23, before faith came, we were kept under guard or we were imprisoned. That's what it's saying there. We were imprisoned by the law. In other words, found guilty, sentenced to death, awaiting execution. That's our place under the law. Verse 24, the law then was our tutor, our pedagogas, our authoritative disciplinarian who points us to Christ. The law was our tutor to point us to Christ. Verse 25, but upon faith in Christ, we're no longer imprisoned under the judgment of the law. Upon faith in Christ, we're no longer under its authoritarian discipline. Why? Why? Verse 26, because you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. You see how our status as sons comes through faith given to us, bestowed upon us through faith. The all in verse 26 refers to all those who put their faith in Christ Jesus. In other words, we are not all children of God in this sense. Faith in Jesus Christ is the means through which God adopts us all as his sons, all of us who put our faith in him. For verse 27, as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. He's not referring there to water baptism. This is speaking of our union with Christ. We are baptized into him and Paul continues that illustration, that metaphor with, we are clothed with him. As many of you as were baptized into him have put on him. Right? Verse 28, there's neither Jew nor Greek. There's neither slave nor free. There's neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise. Chapter four, verse one. Now I say that the heir, as long as he is a child, does not differ at all from a slave, though he is master of all, but is under guardians and stewards until the time appointed by the father. Here's what Paul means by that. The heir or the true son, the one who had title or right to the inheritance was an heir by legal right, but not an heir in fact. He hadn't yet obtained his inheritance. He not taken possession of it. So until he was fully grown, the child then would have been subject to a manager. That's the word for guardian in verse two or an administrator. He would have been under or subject to a household steward and an iconomous, a supervisor as it were. That's the word for steward in verse two. And along with the tutor, the manager, the household steward and the tutor for a young man growing up in a household like that, those three all had full charge over this son, had charge over his education, charge over his discipline, charge over his upbringing. And the child was entirely subject to the manager, to the steward, to the tutor, subject to them until a certain age. And you wouldn't have been able to tell the difference between that son and a slave under a master to anyone looking from the outside, that son would have been slave to his masters, the steward, the manager, the tutor. Even so we, verse three, Paul now draws a connection, a comparison. In the same way we, when we were children, we were in bondage under the elements of this world. In similar fashion, we were once subjects to the traditions, to the philosophies of this world. Verse four, but when the right time had come, when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law in order to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive the adoption as sons. In other words, what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh. Jesus Christ redeemed his people who were born under the judgment of the law, those who were under a sentence of death, and he redeemed them so that, verse five, they might receive the adoption as sons. This glorious privilege afforded us in the gospel. In other words, that's the purpose for our redemption. It's the purpose of God in sending the son, here in Paul's words, in verse five. The purpose of God in sending the son was to pay the required price to buy back, to redeem his people who were in bondage under the law, who were subject to death, subject to judgment, and he was to buy them back, to set them free so that they might receive the adoption as sons. We are saved, brothers and sisters, we are saved to sonship. That is a glorious privilege, a glorious blessing. They aren't natural sons, right? They don't have that status by right, by natural birth. They become sons through divine adoption. They're bestowed that privilege by God Himself. Far greater, isn't it, than adoption in our day, what we see, even though that's a tremendous blessing. Far greater than the state or DCF coming in and rescuing a child from an abusive father. Far greater than that. Far greater, far greater than a child abandoned or abused by their parents, poor destitute having nothing, and adopted by the king as it were, an earthly king, inheriting earthly riches, far, far greater, unspeakably greater. He has delivered us from the kingdom of darkness. He has delivered us from the kingdom of power of sin and death, delivered us from the devil, and has conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love and bestowed upon us unimaginable riches and blessings in Christ. It's at the heart of the gospel, isn't it? Jesus Christ secured that through His person and work. We were strangers to the covenants of the promise, aliens, without God and without hope in this world. And the Lord Jesus Christ took upon Himself our guilt, our shame, our misery. He took that upon Himself by coming in the likeness of sinful flesh by coming in the likeness of men. And He walked in our shoes as it were, the filth, the dirt of this world, bearing upon Himself our sin. He hung on the tree and died for sinners. Hebrews chapter two, verse 10, our author there says that it was fitting for Him. It was fitting for Him in bringing many sons to glory, many sons to glory, right? To make the captain of their salvation perfect through suffering. For both He who sanctifies and those who are being sanctified are all of one. We are one with the Lord Jesus Christ. For which reason the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, is not ashamed to call them what? Brethren. Brethren saying, I will declare your name to my brethren in the midst of the assembly, I will sing praise to you. The Lord Jesus Christ is our elder brother. Do you see? He is our elder brother. God then confirms that sonship, that glorious blessing through the gift of the spirit of His Son. Look at Galatians chapter four, verse six. And because you are sons, God has sent forth the spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, Abba, Father. It's an amazing connection, isn't it? That the Lord Jesus Christ, when the Lord Jesus Christ came in His incarnation, the Lord Jesus Christ in all ways was tempted as we are yet without sin. And the Lord Jesus Christ in the flesh lived His life as a believer does in the power of the spirit. The spirit of God was given to Him without measure, and the Lord Jesus Christ lived His perfect, sinless life in the power of the spirit of God. And when we are adopted as sons and daughters in the kingdom, when we receive the spirit, we are given the same spirit of adoption by which the Lord Jesus Christ perfectly lived on this earth, we are given the spirit of adoption so that we might have the power to be set free from sin and live for Him. We're given the same spirit. Because you are sons, God sent forth the spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, Abba, Father. An earthly father can't give his nature or disposition, as it were, to his adopted son. By nature, he's going to be different than the son whom he adopts. But God can and does by giving us of his spirit, his own spirit. He makes us partakers of the divine nature, Paul says. In other words, the spirit of God brings us into an intimacy with the Father Himself, brings us into communion with the Father Himself that is warm, familial, it's by which we cry out, Abba, Father. The spirit binds us to Him, knits us to Him. Therefore, verse 7, therefore, you are no longer a slave but a son. And if a son, then an heir of God through Christ. We can cast all our cares upon him because he cares for us. I've thought about this before. When someone comes and visits our church, right? Someone brand new to the church, many of you, you are new at one point or another. Some of us don't remember it's been so long, but you're new at some point and you're getting a feel for everything. You begin to get plugged in. At some point, at some point, you maybe don't even think about it, right? But you begin to look around this place as yours. This is my church. These are my brothers. These are my sisters. This is my family. This is our little outpost of heaven. And there comes upon you a sense of ownership and responsibility and love and value. It becomes precious to you, right? This is a gift of the grace of God to us. And we see it that way. It becomes a part of us. There is a sense in which Paul's words in verse 7, you are no longer a slave but a son carries with it that kind of meaning or significance, right? A mere slave does what is his duty to do. But at some point, and it's when we inherit as sons and daughters in God's household, when we're given the spirit of adoption, we no longer conceive of ourselves merely or only as slaves. But we do what we do. We obey. We love. We worship. We pray. We fellowship. We do. We serve as sons in the kingdom. He is our heavenly Father. He is mine. I am his. I've been bought with a price. I'm not my own. Paul can still say I'm a bond slave of the Lord Jesus Christ because my life is to do his will. But there's a higher privilege that informs our understanding of that blessed slavery, isn't there? It's the privilege of being sons and daughters heirs of God through Christ. And those who have received the adoption of sons also have the assurance of that blessedness through the spirit of his son who abides in us. It's a blessed privilege of the child of God. But not only is adoption determined by the Father, not only is adoption secured by the son, but the blessings of adoption are wrought by the spirit. Turn back with me to Romans chapter eight. Romans chapter eight. In Romans chapter eight, Paul begins by explaining that there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. Praise the Lord. No condemnation to those who do not walk according to the flesh, but walk according to the spirit. That's a fruit of those who are in Christ Jesus, a mark of those who are in Christ Jesus. They no longer walk according to the flesh. They walk according to the spirit. Paul explains that to be carnally minded is death. To be spiritually minded is life and peace. So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God. We must be in the spirit. So then Paul explains this beginning in verse nine, verse nine. But you are not in the flesh, but you are in the spirit if indeed the spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the spirit of Christ, he is not his. If you don't have the spirit, you're not a Christian. It doesn't matter what you profess. If you do not have the spirit, you are none of his. And if first 10, if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is a life because of righteousness, the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. But if the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, then he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you. In other words, the spirit who dwells in you is the same spirit who raised Christ from the dead in power. That same powerful spirit, wonder working power, that spirit dwells in you if you're in Christ. And he will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you. Just as the spirit of God raised Jesus Christ from the dead in power, even so the same spirit now and dwells the believer will give new life to that believer. There will be a marked change in your life due to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Verse 12, therefore brethren, we are then debtors, not to the flesh to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh, you will die. But if by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God. Who are the sons of God? Those who are led by the Spirit of God. Right? Who are the sons of God? Those who live and don't die. Right? We are led by the Spirit of God. If we're led by the Spirit of God, we are sons of God. And if you are sons of God, you will live. In other words, for the believer, there is an ongoing battle with sin, an ongoing mortification of sin, a putting to death of sin. That ongoing battle, that ongoing mortification marks or characterizes those who are the children of God. Why? Because the spirit of holiness indwells them and is at work in them to put to death their sin. Do you see? The professing Christian who shows no concern for repentance, the professing Christian who has no conviction over sin, the professing Christian who has no God word sorrow leading to diligence, leading to earnestness, leading to indignation, to fear of God, to vehement desire, to a hunger and thirst for righteousness, to zeal, to vindication is no son of God. Do you see? The professing Christian who shows no marks of this ongoing battle, this ongoing mortification of the deeds of the body is no son of God. The sons of God are those being led by the Spirit of God. And the Spirit of God produces the fruits of the Spirit in the lives of his sons. You won't always have this overwhelming sense or acknowledgement or recognition of that fact. Sometimes we feel, don't we, far from the Lord. Sometimes we feel cold or dead with respect to our sin. But we cry out, Abba Father, help me, help me when I feel cold, when I feel distant. It's the Spirit of God that brings that acknowledgement once again to our hearts. And through that we can acknowledge that we are led by the Spirit. Verse 15, because you did not receive the Spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out Abba Father. The Spirit himself bears witness with our Spirit that we are children of God. And if children then heirs, heirs of God, joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with him that we may also be glorified together. We're led by the Spirit of God. Spirit of God leads in many ways. Spirit of God leads through illumination. We pray often, don't we? Spirit of God, please, illumine my understanding. Help me to understand your word. The Spirit of God opened up the heart and mind of Lydia that she might understand those things spoken by Paul, right? The Spirit of God leads through illumination. They will not hear or obey or follow the voice of a stranger. Jesus Christ says, my sheep hear my voice and they follow me. In other words, someone illumined by the Spirit of God has the Spirit of God dwelling in them, will not cater off after a false teacher to their destruction. The Lord of God preserves them in the truth. The Spirit of God leads through sanctification. The Spirit of God leads us in sanctification. If you are not being sanctified, you are not being led by the Spirit. You are none of his. Those who are his are being sanctified by a work of the Spirit in them. The Spirit leads through sanctification. The Spirit leads through divine preservation. We are preserved to the end by a work of the Spirit of God. We're preserved until we receive the fullness of our inheritance as sons of glory, sons in glory. We're preserved. We're sealed by the Spirit of promise. Paul goes on to say, verse 18, for I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us for the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits for the revealing of the sons of God. There is one day coming soon where we will be revealed as sons of God. We don't know yet exactly what we shall be, but we know that when we see him we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is. In that day there is a revealing of the sons of God. In other words, there is an aspect of already and not yet to our adoption. We're adopted. We're sons of God, but we will be revealed as sons of God in glory when he comes. Awesome, awesome thought. Verse 20, for the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it in hope, because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. What an amazing thought, right? Even the creation is groaning, awaiting the revelation of our glory as children of God, and the creation is made over for us. We will inhabit a new heavens and a new earth, the children of God, the sons of God. Not only that, but we also, verse 23, who have the first fruits of the spirit, even we ourselves, grown within ourselves, eagerly awaiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body. Amen. For we were saved in this hope, but hope that is seen is not hoped for why does one still hope for what he sees, but if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance. Listen, brothers and sisters, the best is yet to come. The best is yet to come. What shall we say to these things? Words fail, right? Words fail. We're just, like, just not even nicking the surface. Behold, what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us that we should be called children of God. Can you catch a little glimpse, can't you, of John? I'm the disciple whom Jesus loved. I am one whom Jesus Christ has loved. A staggering thought. Staggering thought. He bestows upon us the privilege, the blessing of sonship. God the Father looks upon us sinners, undeserving, wretched sinners. He looks upon us as though we were born sons in his household. All that by virtue of our union with our elder brother, the captain of our salvation, the Lord Jesus Christ. We live today at a time when fatherlessness is rampant. The culture is so hell bent on undermining and unraveling what they call the nuclear family, right? The family values that are derived from the Bible, right? That those, the family was instituted by God. And so this wicked culture set against everything to do with God, including the family. Broken homes today are more the rule than they are the exception. That is a shameful stat, isn't it? Broken homes today are far more common, far more common than godly biblical homes. Just as wisdom is justified by our children, the foolishness, the wickedness of this age will be recognized or acknowledged by her foolishness, her wickedness. And what we see today is just the beginning of the rot. And it's only going to spread. It's only going to get worse. And yet, and yet, we have communion with our Heavenly Father as sons or daughters in his household. This is not our home. This is not our citizenry. We are citizens of heaven, children of the king. And that exalted status will never be reversed. That exalted status will never be undone. Who will separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus, our Lord? No one and no thing. We're thinking about it. I was talking with a sister earlier, like Mephibosheth. If you remember that story, that account from the Old Testament, Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan, lame in his feet. It really does sort of depict us, right? Can't walk this life, lame in his feet. And Mephibosheth was given the blessing, the privilege of eating as a son in the king's household at the king's table all the days of his life. We get to eat at our father's table like a son forever. It is the height, the apex of redemptive blessing, redemptive grace. But now that also comes to us, brothers and sisters, with responsibility. We are to live as sons and daughters. And that's not begrudging to the Christian. That's the joy of the Christian life, is to be able in the power of the Spirit to live like a son, live like a daughter. We owe him, don't we, a debt of gratitude. We owe him a debt of worship. We owe him a debt of praise, a debt of devotion. We owe him affection, heart, soul, mind, and strength. We owe him obedience. And that in love, not in a cold, sterile, heartless obligation, but in love as sons and daughters as those who will inherit with our Lord. When we do not, he lovingly disciplines us as sons in his fatherly displeasure. If we don't face the loving, fatherly discipline of God, then we are illegitimate and not sons. All that, that we may be partakers of his holiness in that he does us good. All this gets at the heart of our relationship to God, doesn't it? It really is the sum, if you will, the summary of the Christian life. Adopted sons and daughters by propitiation. Adopted sons of daughters by the work of the son. J. I. Packer said this, our understanding of Christianity cannot be better than our grasp of adoption. It simply can't. The more that we grasp an understanding of adoption in our place as sons and daughters, the more that we understand the Christian life. He says, adoption is an act of God's free grace, whereby for the sake of Christ, he formally translates the regenerate from the family of Satan into his own family and legally confirms them in all of the rights, immunities and privileges of his children. All praise, honor, glory and blessing be to him who has predestined us to adoption as sons. Amen. Let's pray. Take just a few moments. Pray silently to yourself. Consider whether you have been adopted into his household and then ask the Lord to bless to your heart and mind the glories of that truth. Let's pray. Father in heaven, I pray Lord for the glory that is due your name. That you would, having bestowed upon us the blessed privilege of being sons of the living God, that you would also in grace and mercy to his Lord bestow upon us the strength that we need by your spirit to live for you earnestly as sons and daughters. You would bestow upon us the wisdom that comes by your spirit through your word to see with the eyes of faith the reality of our life in the spirit for you that we would worship you as we understand yourself to be revealed to us in scripture that we would devote ourselves to you heart, soul, mind and strength that we would take upon ourselves the responsibilities of the privilege of being sons and daughters in your kingdom and that we would live in the strength that your spirit supplies as trophies of your grace. I pray Lord that if there's anyone here who is cast out and not a son or a daughter that you would for the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ bring them to repentance and faith and grant that they too might sit at your table in the kingdom for your namesake for the glory of the Son and we pray all these things in his blessed name. Amen.