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Guest Speakers

The Spirit of Adoption

Dr. Thomas White

January 17, 2016 | Romans 8:12-17

Topic:

Sermon Transcript

If you have your Bibles, and I hope you do, open them up to Romans 8:12-17. We’re going to look at those verses this morning. As we look at those, let me just give you a little bit of an introduction to get you caught up to speed on Romans chapter 8. It will help just to understand the contrast between Romans 7 and Romans 8.

In Romans 7, the commentators—those who study this—disagree on whether Paul is talking about those who are lost and do not have the Holy Spirit, or whether he is talking about walking through the Christian life without relying on the power of the Holy Spirit.

But what is clear is that, in Romans 7 you see the words “I,” “me” and “my” over forty times, depending on your translation. What do “I,” “me” and “my” get us in the Christian life? It’s very clear in Romans 7:24, where Paul writes, “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?”  There’s a great contrast between the “I,” “me” and “myand “the body of death” in Romans 7, when you move to Romans 8:1.

You see the contrast at the very beginning, where it says, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” You see in Romans 8 the word “spirit” mentioned 22 times. You have this contrast set up for you between life in “I,” “me” and “my” and life in the power of the Spirit. That context will help you as we get to our passage for today, as we look at the spirit of adoption in Romans 8:12-17.

You understand, as I do, that we need to be pro-life. We need to take a stand for the unborn. We need to understand that just because of location or stage of development, it doesn’t mean it is not a life given by God. But as we do that, we need to create a culture that is more than just pro-life—we need to create a culture of adoption—a culture of support—a culture where we will come alongside. That’s a very theological concept that I want us to look at here today as we look at Romans 8:12-17. But let me start you off through it this way.

It was January 2005. I’m walking down the steps at the place where I worked at the time, Southwestern Seminary in Ft. Worth, Texas. As I’m walking down the steps, my pocket begins to vibrate—I realize I’m getting a phone call and as I answer—probably as many of you do—I look to see who’s calling. It’s my wife’s aunt. I don’t how close you are to the relatives of those you’ve married, but my wife’s aunt never called me. We had a good relationship, but this was the first call I’d ever received from her directly to my cell phone, so I thought, “Something bad has happened.”

I immediately answered. We didn’t talk very often, so there wasn’t a lot of chit-chat. She got right to the point. She said, “I’ve got a question for you. Would you like to adopt a little girl?” Immediately, in my heart, I wanted to say, “Yes!” but I really believe it was of the Holy Spirit that I was prompted and reminded, “You had better talk to your wife before you answer this question!”

I called my wife and told her, “This is what happened.” My wife started asking a lot of questions, none of which I had had the foresight to ask before I called her! I said, “I just need to know—do you want to move forward with this or not?” She said, “Yes,” so I called her aunt back and told her we wanted to go forward with this and we’d find out the details later.

I went from there to the chapel service, and it wasn’t the end of the service—it was toward the beginning—and the person leading the service there at Southwestern said, “If something’s on your heart, please come down to the altar and pray about it.” I said, “Okay, God, I don’t know what’s going on—it’s not typical. . .” but I got up and went down and began to pray.

I’ll never forget the prayer I prayed. I’ve often thought I would like God to send me text messages with daily directions and tell me what to do, but he doesn’t do it. I remember that day praying, “God, I’m not looking for a sign; I’m not looking for you to write down things in the clouds; I’m not looking for a text message, but I believe that this is good and godly and biblical, so I’m going forward. If you don’t want me to go forward, slam the door in my face.”

I believe that should be our prayer, for all of us, when we’re pursuing good, godly, biblical things like adoption and foster care and all. “We’re going. Slam the door if you don’t want us to do this.”

I prayed this prayer, then got up. I was sitting a third to half-way back. As I walked back to my seat, I looked at the seat I’d been sitting in. The only person I knew in Ft. Worth at the time who had adopted children was sitting in my seat! I’m not saying that God wrote it in the clouds, but that was a pretty clear indication that God wanted us to move forward.

In fact, if you’d seen my seat, I had stuff all underneath it. So, when I sat down beside him, I had to grab all of this stuff out from under the seat he had sat in, to move it over to my seat. He said, “Man, I’m sorry. I must not have been paying attention when I sat down. I don’t know what happened.” I said, “I think I do. We need to talk. Can we go out to dinner tonight, you and your wife and me and my wife?” So we did, and we talked.

A long story, short—to give you that framework—nine days later we’re in a lawyer’s office in another state (that’s how fast this was!). I call that efficiency at its finest, right? Most people take nine months; nine days for us is all it took for us!

But there are a couple of highlights in that story: We called to get the home study (because you have to get one), and they said, “Look, it takes months to make this type of stuff happen. We have some openings a month or so from now.” We said, “Look, we’re trying to do this as a private adoption—this just sort of fell in our laps—we want to move forward with it. Put us on your waiting list or something.”

They called back the next morning and they said, “We’ve had two cancellations. We can come now if you want us to come now.” Our response was obviously, “Yes!” So, what did we do? Well, “stash and dash” is what we call it, where you just stash stuff and throw it in a closet, lean back against the door and shut it and hope they don’t open it because it could be hazardous to their health! Maybe you’ve been there; we were there. They came and did the home study.

We called to get a doctor, because you have to have a doctor of record, and we asked, “Who’s a good doctor?” They told us, and everybody kept saying the same doctor, so we called. The receptionist said, “This is the most popular doctor in Ft. Worth. People call and get on the waiting list—nine months before they’re thinking about having a baby in hopes that there will be an opening by the time a child is born.” We said, “Look, we don’t know all this type stuff. We don’t have any children; we’ve got an adoption that’s coming up.”

She said, “Hold on a second,” and she went back and talked to the doctor, came back and said, “You’ve got your doctor of record. How did you know that Dr. Worsley was adopted?” We had no clue that he was adopted as a baby. Lawyers in two states filling out paperwork, talking to one another and completing it all in nine days is a miracle in and of itself right? I’m just kidding. If you’re a lawyer in here today, don’t get offended, alright?

We walked into the lawyer’s office nine days later. As we walked into that office that morning, I had no relationship to this little girl. She had a different name. I had no legal precedent, no legal authority, no relationship. They took us off into one room on one side, they took her birth parents with her off to another room on another side, they talked to them for what seemed like an eternity but was probably an hour or so. They came to us and talked to us, we signed some paperwork we filled out some documents, we hand them the documents and they go do them in triplicate and some other stuff.

The next thing you know, they’re bringing this little girl into the room, and they say to us at that point, “She’s yours!” She now has a new name; her last name is now White—which is great, because she gets to live in the White house no matter wherever she goes in life, which is pretty cool, right? They handed her to me. I’m a new dad, this was our first child; I’m young, I don’t have a clue as to what’s going on with all this stuff. . .but all I know is, from my football days, “Don’t fumble!” Right?

So, I cradled the little girl and covered the tip of the “ball,” or the baby as it would be, and tucked her in gently to my chest so there would be no fumble if I were to be hit or whatever—I don’t know what I was thinking! You’ve seen fathers like that before, right! They tuck the baby in—there’s protection there.

I reached to pick up some of the bags, to carry them (and my mom and dad had come down—first grandchild—so if you’re a grandparent, you understand all that. . .) and my mom looked at me at that moment and said to me, “Do you want me to carry her?”

Now, I didn’t understand, at the moment, all the ramifications of a grandmother wanting to carry a first grandchild, but I remember looking into my daughter’s eyes, this baby I’d just been handed, and thinking, “How can I love somebody so much that I really don’t even know?”

And I remember looking back at my mom and saying, “Mom, she will never be as safe as she is right now in Daddy’s arms.” I can tell you, that was true then and it’s true now! I would die at sunup for my daughter. Any of you dads in the room have daughters? You can testify! You would do that.

In fact, just to give you a glimpse into me and my personality and my life—it will help as we connect some points later on—I’m a fourth degree black belt in martial arts. I won the world amateur championship in 1993, and I’m in the world martial arts hall of fame. If you pick on me, that’s a bad idea, okay?

I grew up, lived in Texas, and have lots and lots of guns—so if you mess with my wife, that’s a really bad idea! If you mess with my daughter, that’s God calling me to prison ministry—from the inside! We’re going to have cell groups and a gated community—but I’m going to be there, because there’s no doubt I would die at sunup for that little girl. That’s a human, earthly, sinful, flawed father and his love for his little girl!

And we, if you have repented of your sins and have put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ, have been adopted as sons of the King! As sons of Almighty God, who defines love. Love does not define him, but he defines love. . .a God who loves us with an infinite, perfect, boundless love, who loved us in such a way that while we were yet sinners he died for us. That’s the God that we are here singing praises to and reading about. He is the God who loves us and has adopted us into his family! That’s the theological principle of adoption.

Romans chapter 8:12-17: God’s Word is authoritative, it is inspired, it is as though God spoke it and wrote it Himself. So, would you stand with me in honor of the reading of the text of Scripture? Paul says, “So then, brothers, we are 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 all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’ The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.”

Oh, dear Lord, as we look at this text of Scripture,  I pray that You would help us just to catch just a glimpse of Your glory and Your grace and Your love for us. Father, may we not live as slaves in fear. May we, by the power of the Spirit, put to death those temptations. May we cry out to You as our Abba Father. Lord, we ask this in Jesus’ Name, Amen. You may be seated.

There are two points in this text as it breaks down. The first one is that:

 

  • The Spirit leads to life.

 

You’ll see that in verses 12 and 13. You’ll see the text talks about that we’re not debtors to the flesh, to live according to the flesh—which means we will die—but it’s by the Spirit that we put that to death so that we will live! The Spirit leads to life.

There’s a second point in verses 14-17:

 

  • The Spirit affirms our sonship.

 

You’ll see that as we get to that a little later on, but verse 12 starts, “So then. . .” The “so then” takes us up to the point, “What do we do now?” Paul has talked to us about—in Romans 7—the “I,” me,” “my,” the wretched person that I am—who will rescue me? He’s moving to the power of the Spirit, living life in the Spirit, so he says, “So then. . .” “Let’s get to the point.” “So then, this is how we are to respond.”

And then he says, “brothers.” We use the term brothers casually all the time; we use it flippantly even, in some occasions. I know, for my own self, there are times when I use it – you know, there are times when I go to a convention or a conference or I see somebody. You see them walking up from a distance, and they look at you, and they smile and make eye contact and you’re looking at them and they begin walking on that beeline in your direction.

You think, “That face is familiar, I should know them, but I just can’t put a name with the face. I’m not sure where I know them from.” They walk up to you and they reach out their hand and they greet you by name, and you look at them and you reach out the hand, and you say to them confidently, “How are you, brother?” Perhaps you even do it in a congregation this large.

I work on a university campus. That’s where I serve the Lord and so I hear the word “brother” in a different context, too. I will see, from time to time, guys who look across the room, and when they look across the room, they see this beautiful, angelic girl who loves Jesus and who’s very pretty.

What happens if you’re a godly guy when you see a very pretty girl who loves Jesus? You want to go get to know her, right? So you go over. And I can see it in their eyes as they float across the room to talk to this girl. They have this grin as they greet her, with their shoulders back and their chest out, and they say, “You are just a majestic figure and I love. . .your eyes sparkle as the stars in the night. . .you are one of God’s greatest creations and I would just love to go out with you sometime and get to know you.”

And you see the girl fidgeting on the other side and she looks back at him and she says, “You know, I really don’t like you in that way. I like you like a…[congregation responds “brother!”] That’s happened to some of you! Alright. It never happened to me at all, I’m saying. . .So, she takes that dagger and she thrusts it into his poor soul and he begins to limp, woundedly, back over to his pack, as he rips the dagger from his back, and he is a…brother. That’s not the use here, okay?

What Paul is saying is not the “I don’t really know you,” or “I don’t like you in that way.” He’s saying “brothers” as brothers and sisters in Christ, fellow redeemed, those whom Jesus has paid for and bought with His blood. We are brothers and sisters. So he’s addressing us—he’s addressing those who would call themselves followers of Christ, brothers and sisters in Christ. “So, then brothers—brothers in Christ who are believers and followers, this text applies to us!”

“We are debtors, not to the flesh.” What does that mean? I’m not a debtor to the flesh? Our first thought goes immediately to skin, this skin that we have that covers our bones and our sinew and our muscles and joints and our arteries and our veins, etc. We know that’s not what he means. We’re not debtors to our skin; it doesn’t mean we need to go buy better skin care products and treat our skin in a better way, or something of that nature.

We know, theologically, this is a very loaded statement, and that what Paul is saying is that, when Adam sinned in the Garden of Eden, Adam sinned as a representative of mankind. In that sin, death and a sinful nature came to man and woman from that point forward, so that all of us are born with a sinful nature that causes us to run away from God. We don’t have to learn how to be bad—it comes very naturally to us.

We look out at society and we see it in everyone; we look in the Bible and it tells us, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Why is it that not a single person ever, besides Jesus Christ, has lived a perfect life? It’s because we are all sinful in our nature, to our core. Our “heart is deceitfully wicked, who can know it?” the book of Jeremiah tells us. Because we are running away from God to fulfill that fleshly desire, that sinful nature, that tempts us to flee from our Creator.

Paul is saying to us, as believers, we are debtors not to that fleshly desire—we owe it nothing. It leads to death. We don’t owe those temptations anything! We are not in bondage or slavery to them anymore, if the Holy Spirit lives within us. This is not who we should owe anything to—it is Jesus who has bought us with a price, who has redeemed us, who has bought us with a price, who has ransomed us, who has given his life as a substitute for ours, who has paid our penalty so that we might have life and have it more abundantly! That’s who we owe something to—it’s to Jesus—not to this sinful fleshly desire.

So… “Brothers, you are not a debtor to your sinful desires. You owe them nothing! If you live according to those sinful desires, to that flesh, you will die!” What does it mean to live according to sinful desires? Romans 8:5 tells us: “For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.”

Where’s your mind set? Is your mind directionally set on the things of God? Is it set on reading God’s Word, meditating on God’s Word, hiding God’s Word in your heart that you might not sin against him, renewing your mind daily, refreshing your mind, conforming your mind to God—not to the world—so that you read his Word, you meditate on it, you memorize it, you pray to God? Is that where your mind’s set? Or is your mind set on the things of the world, the flesh, the earthly desires, the sinful things, the pleasures this world may offer, which are fleeting. Is that where your mind’s set?

That’s a good inventory for us to take this morning—which way do we set our minds and where are we at this particular point? And it changes with us each day, in that we can have our mind set in the right direction, but oh so quickly – we can shift and turn our minds in a different direction. We must renew our minds daily to make sure we have our minds set on the things of the Spirit. Here, Paul says, “If you live according to the flesh you’re gonna die, but. . .”

Notice what it says here, “but if, by the Spirit, you put to death the deeds of the body. . .” There’s a cooperative effort—and don’t misunderstand me. Salvation is by grace through faith, “not a result of works, lest any man should boast…” But in that sanctification process, as we work out our salvation with fear and trembling, as Philippians says, “. . .for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. . .” But we work it out—in this text it says by the power of the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body.

Some people, in their minds, think, “I can sit on the couch and do nothing. I can sit here and say, ‘God, you take care of it. I’m just going to sit around.” And you’re going to become spiritual. That’s not how it works! It’s not that you sit around as a lazy believer and do nothing – never read your Bible, never memorize Scripture, never meditate on Scripture, never go to church, never develop friendships. That’s not the Christian life! You have to do things! But you can’t do them alone. That’s Romans chapter 7—“I,” “me,” “mine”. . .this wretched body of death! So it is by the power of the Holy Spirit.

You say, “Well, how do I get this power?” If you’ve repented of your sins and put your faith in Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit comes to live within you. The New Testament describes it as though we are the tabernacle, the temple of God. In fact, it uses the word for the inner temple, the Holy of Holies.

The Spirit takes up residence within us in a way that we can say we have the power of the Holy Spirit in our Christian life, the power of that Spirit that was there when the whole universe was created. The power of that Spirit that raised Jesus from that dead lives within us—that is the power that we have access to, if we use it.

“By the power of the Spirit, you” look at the language – “put to death the deeds of the body!” This convicts me, because far too often in my own life, I can rationalize about my own sin; I can compare myself with others. I can say things like, “Yeah but, well, you know, I was born being a guy that liked violence.”

I mean, football, karate—you’ve already heard it and you’ve only known me but twenty minutes, now. I used to have a tendency to have an angry temper. But when I look at the Scripture, violence is not pleasing to the Lord. We should not love violence; you are not to lose your temper; you are to be self-controlled.

So we look at these things and we cannot make peace with our sin. And so, I ask you, have you made peace with your sin—or are you putting to death those sinful temptations? And the text tells us it’s by the power of the Spirit we put those deeds to death!

Again, I confess to you, this is a struggle for me, because when I look at my own life, I like to be the guy that pulls up his own bootstraps. I like to be the guy who puts those shoulders back and says, “I can carry the load; I can take care of it myself.” And so, far too often, I find myself in my own spiritual walk with God, trying to do things with my own power, trying to do things in and of myself rather than relying on the power of the Holy Spirit.

Anybody out there that’s self-dependent? There’s a few of us out there that are raising hands saying, “Yeah, that’s us.” I’ll prove to you that there are more of you like that than you think, because last time you went to watch an Avengers movie or something, did you walk out being the people that got squashed, or did you walk out being Captain America or Iron Man or Hulk, smashing everything?

I’ve never seen people dressed up at Halloween as the people that got squashed; they’re always dressed up as Captain America or Hulk or Iron Man. If you are old enough to be like me, and you’ve gone to see a Rocky movie, when you walked out of a Rocky movie you walked out pumped up, you walked up fired up, you were excited. You even throw your popcorn away in a different method! You chuck that popcorn into that trash can!

Somebody looks at you, and you say, “Man, didn’t you see me up there on that screen? Don’t mess with me! I’ll take you out right here in the movie theater!” I’m only kidding, but you know how they get us pumped up and excited! We walk out of those theaters as though we can walk on the clouds and we are the heroes!

We are Chuck Norris, and we will take out three countries of armies with a pocket knife—and it’s no problem for us to do that before breakfast—and we are Jack Bauer who will save the world in twenty-four hours, on four different continents in three time zones, and have time left over to spare, right? It’s American individualism, and it’s what we do! We think of ourselves as the warriors who walk into the MMA ring, and we close the cage doors and we will take it out!

But, brothers and sisters, the spiritual weapons of our warfare are not chokeholds and arm bars. The spiritual weapons of our warfare are the power of the Holy Spirit, and the Word of God that lives and breathes and is sharper and more active than a two-edged sword. It’s the fact that we can renew our minds to what his will is, and we cannot walk around with the attitude that comes so easily to our fleshly desires. We have to conform to what the text says here, “by the power of the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body and you will live.”

Verse 14 transitions to a section in which the Spirit affirms our sonship. You’ll see it there. It says, “For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.” The passage says we “have received the Spirit of adoption [in verse 15] as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” [16] The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.” The Spirit that’s within us affirms our sonship.

You see here in verse 14, again, that cooperative-type effort where it says, “For all who are led by the Spirit. . .” The Spirit leads, the Spirit knows the way—but in order “to be led” means we must follow. How often is it in our own lives that we don’t follow the leading of the Holy Spirit?

So, we had a German Shepherd that passed away last semester, and this was a German Shepherd who stayed in the house. Her name was Princess and we treated her like it. She had hip dysplasia and was going blind at the end of her life, and I would carry her up and down the steps every day so she could be with us at night. I mean, this was a good dog. Has anybody ever had one of those good dogs?

I mean, this was one of those dogs that—when I was sick and lay in bed five days with the flu—she refused to go anywhere, she refused to do anything other than lay right there beside me, because that wasn’t right—something was wrong.

This was one of those dogs that, when I mowed our one acre in the back yard—even though the dust would fly up and hit her right in the face—it was her obligation and duty to walk right behind that lawn mower and do every single lap with me.

I don’t have a clue why, but that is how loyal this dog was. So I carried her up and down the steps and we made steak for her in her final days, and we treated this dog like she was a princess, because she was a princess.

So, I was walking with her and leading her to go outside, and she turned and she went off to the left. And I thought, to her, “Just follow me. I’m gonna take care of you; I always take care of you. Just follow me. I know what’s best, I know where you need to go.” And I went back and kind of nudged her on the side. “Come on, let’s go. You need to go this way.”

And as I was doing that, the thought struck my mind, “How often is it that the Holy Spirit is leading us, and in that walk when the Holy Spirit is telling us ‘you need to do that,’ or ‘you need to do this. . .’ and in my own mind—I probably don’t say it out loud—but in the rebellion of my own heart, I think to God, “No, that’s not the best way to go. I want to go that way. It looks more attractive; I think it would be more pleasurable; I think it would be a better way to go. . .Yeah, I don’t think You know right. . .” and we turn and stop following the Holy Spirit.

And, even though it’s not rational when we think about why do we sin in light of a God who loves us and wants what’s best for us, and in light of eternity—we still do it and we do it all the time. The text tells us to be led by the Spirit, and what happens when we turn over to the side? We stay there and we go into spiritual dryness—until we are convicted and then we repent, and we get back in line and we say, “You know what, Holy Spirit, you knew better all along. Let me follow you. . .” a little while longer, until we come to that next moment where we say, “Ohh, I don’t know. . .” Have you been there?

Those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. The Word says, “For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons. . .” And I cannot help but, when I read this text, think back to the children of Israel.

In Exodus 4:22, God calls the children of Israel, “my firstborn son.” God says to the children of Israel—as He had promised Abraham, “You are my people; you are my son; you are adopted as my people.” He sends Moses, he has all of these plagues, he does all of these miracles; he rescues them miraculously. The army comes up against them, he parts the Red Sea, he leads them across on dry ground, he closes the waters in to destroy the mightiest army of the day, and he’s going to take them into the Promised Land. He has adopted them as sons—but what do they do?

They’re no longer slaves, but in Exodus 16:2, they say, “O You brought us out here to starve us to death!” And God provides manna for them. In Exodus 17:2, they said, “We have no water; we are going to thirst to death!” And God brings water out of the rock for them!

In Exodus 32:1, they said, “Where is this Moses who’s leading us? We don’t know who he is or where he is or what’s going on. Who is this guy?” In Numbers 11:1, Scripture says everybody groaned and murmured and  complained! And you get this idea of them all just complaining constantly.

In Numbers 11:5, they said, “We’re sick of manna! Yeah, you gave us this food. We don’t like how it tastes anymore! We want something different! No more McDonald’s for us! We need something new!” And they complained. And then in Numbers 14:2, they said, “We would have been better off if we would have died in Egypt!”

And we read that, and we think logically, “Are you people crazy? How foolish! God miraculously saved you and brought you out of slavery, and gave you a promised land to go to, and sustains you daily with food and water, and you complain and murmur and groan against him!” And then I think about my own life, and I remember how God bought my sinful rebellious heart when my heart cried out, and he said, “How can I help you?” (Referring to “Siri”.) Jesus responded and said, “I got you covered.” He did what Siri never could! He redeems you, and he bought us out of the slavery to our own sin.

And then what happens? We walk with him for a little while, and he sustains us and provides for us, and then we drift off into our own sinful fleshly desires, don’t we? We’re there! I’m not preaching at you, I’m here with you; this is the life that we live. And Scripture says here, We “did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”

I’m reminded of a story with my daughter. She’s not here—I tell a lot of stories about her when she’s not here. Usually, when I come home, she would run to the door, she would give me a hug. So I would be greeted by my children and two dogs with very waggly tails, and it’s awesome! If you’re a dad coming home from a trip or a mom coming home from being gone, it’s just an amazing feeling.

I came in from an out-of-town trip, and two dogs with waggly tails were greeting me, but no daughter! And I said, “Aww, this is a problem. I don’t like this. Where is she? She must be upstairs, and didn’t hear the garage door or something.” So I walked in and went into the living room, and my wife is in the recliner, and we’ve got a couch that seats three people. I sat down on the spot where I usually do on the far left side, because it has the best spot for the TV, and that’s where every man needs to sit, right? I’m just kidding—but that’s where I sit.

I sat on the couch there and I notice that, up our stairs (which went up and then curved to go up to the second story—so on that middle landing) I saw  some hair kind of floating around that middle landing. And then I saw my daughter and she would kind of peek around the staircase, and so I thought, “Okay, maybe we’re playing peekaboo.” So I would look up at her to catch her peeking, and she would jerk back.

She was still at that age where she thought, “If I can’t see you, you can’t see me,” so there was still an arm creeping out from behind the corner, and hair flopping out along the side, even though her eyes were covered back and she thought she could not be seen. So we played the game for a few minutes.

There was no laughter, and I realized this is not really a game; what was going on? So I said, “Rachel, come down!” She comes down the stairs like this. Now what does that mean? For an astute father like me, that means she’s in trouble, right?

So she came down and said, “I’m in trouble.” Again, profoundly wise, so I said, “I know that. What did you do?” Just kidding about all that “wise” stuff. This was obvious. She had her finger in her mouth and said, “I ate candy and hid the wrappers.” I looked over at my wife, not being able to interpret the tones that were being inappropriately spoken in our house at the moment, and I said, “What did she say?”

Joy said, “She ate candy and hid the wrappers up on top.” I learned that we had decorative bowls that you place up on top of the cabinets and you only use when special guests come around, and my daughter had eaten chocolate candy and other candy and hid the wrappers up in those special bowls.

Sometimes those bowls obviously do come down, and she didn’t think- that weekend those bowls came down, and when my wife put one of those bowls down—it was a big white bowl—there were candy wrappers filling the inside of that big bowl and she was caught red-handed!

I’m sitting on the couch, as a father, thinking to myself the obvious thought most dads are thinking. “That’s funny!” My next thought is, “C’mon girl! We have a trash compactor three steps away! Open something, tuck it under, close it down and smash it! You’ve got to get better at this!”

But I can’t say that, obviously. So, as a dad who wants to direct his daughter’s heart toward God—to live a life that glorifies him—I know I can’t smile, I can’t laugh out loud. I have to deal with the deceptiveness that is in her heart, which is the real issue.

Let’s be honest—if she would have come to me and said, “Dad, I want to eat some chocolate. Would you eat it with me?” I would have said, “Yes!” because I like any excuse to eat chocolate! I would have given her more chocolate than she ever could have eaten the other way, and she could have enjoyed it right there on the couch beside me—and we would have had chocolate everywhere, because chocolate is a Godsend. I’m sitting there hiding all of those thoughts, to say to her, “You can’t be deceptive like this! This is a trait that will wreck your life—if you have deceptiveness in your heart.” And we all know this.

But my daughter, who has come down the stairs, has gone to the end of the couch, and has squeezed in, as close as she possibly can, to the opposite side of the couch from me, because I told her to sit down. So, I’m sitting on the left-hand side of the couch laughing inside, and then dealing with deceptiveness, and see my daughter (that I love and would die for at sunup) as far as away from me as she could possibly be and still be on the couch.

I wonder, “Sin and deceptiveness has harmed the relationship with the daughter that all I wanted was a big welcome-home hug from, and then I would have broken out the chocolate!” How many of us are living our spiritual lives, right now, tucked into the corner of the couch as far away from God as we could possibly be and still be on the couch?

You’re here! You came to church this morning, but you are tucked on that far end of the couch as far away from God, because sin and deceptiveness and the rebellion of your heart has you separated from God. And I am a flawed, sinful but loving father. God Almighty is perfect and holy in his love, and compassionate, and slow to anger, and yet we are still tucked away in a spirit of slavery to our sin and a spirit of fear, and not in a spirit of adoption, crying out “Abba, Father!” And my challenge to you on that this morning is to say to you, “Don’t sit on the edge of the couch, but cry out in repentance to the God who loves you!” Cry out and get rid of the sin and the deceptiveness of your heart and put it to death. . .and reach out to give God Almighty a spiritual hug to say, “God, I want to live a life that glorifies you! You are a good and gracious God!” That’s the God we’re here to worship and serve today!

We have a spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.” Now some of you may read this and question, “Why are we adopted as sons?” Sons had a relationship, in this day and time, and an inheritance. Daughters only had a relationship. What Paul is saying is, we are all—male and female—adopted as sons. All of us—male and female—have a relationship with Christ, and we have an inheritance from God Almighty. We are all adopted into that special relationship, in that special way, adopted as sons by whom we cry out “Abba, Father!”

“Abba Father” should spark in your minds Mark 14:36, Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, where those sweat drops become drops of blood as he’s praying in agony. He’s praying, “Let this cup pass by me,” and he’s crying out “Abba! Father!” as if he’s crying out, “Daddy! Abba, Father! Let this cup pass by me!” And here Scripture is saying we have this spirit of adoption by whom we can cry out “Abba! Father!” The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God.

Now, contrast that image of my daughter with the one at the zoo. We go to the zoo, and if you’ve ever been to the zoo, at the lion exhibit, where the lions will sometimes roar greatly—and when they do it will reverberate through your entire body—and it’s just an awesome experience! So, I like that experience so much that I often taunt the lions (even though the sign says not to) to see if we can get them to roar!

So, I’m giving the lions a hard time and one of them lets out this roar! So my daughter’s standing right beside me when it roars, and it reverberates through us. She goes from flat-footed to up, legs around, arms around, head tucked into my neck, and my arms go around her, and I say to her at that time what every good father would say: “I will protect you!”

You all know, if that lion came out from behind that cage, there is nothing—nothing—I can do to protect her, other than to say to her, “You run!” and to the lion “You eat me!” That’s it, right? That’s the best I can do to protect her, but that’s what every dad would do—“I’ll protect you. That’s why I’m here. I’ve got you covered.”

Now, my daughter did not look up at me at that particular moment in time and say to me, “Father, I would like to see the adoption paperwork, where it’s legally signed over that you are now my dad and I am your daughter.” She has never asked to see that paperwork. Why? Because there is a spirit within her that testifies to her that I’m Daddy. There’s a spirit within her that testifies to her, “When I need protecting, I know where to go. I know who’s willing to die at sunup.” She knows.

And there should be a spirit within us that testifies to us that there is a great and glorious God who loves us beyond our wildest ability to comprehend his perfect unfathomable love, and the depths of his glory and grace. And it should testify to us that he is trustworthy and reliable and we can trust him and we can serve him and we can love him. . .and we should follow him. That’s the God that we’re here to serve. Does the Spirit bear witness with your spirit?

If we’re a child of God, verse 17 tells us, “and if children, then heirs—heirs of God. . .” I think about my own children and, as a preacher, there’s not much that they’re going to inherit when I die one day, there’s not much there to offer them, and some of you have that same situation. They’re not going to be rich from what they get from Dad—that’s just not going to happen.

But here it says there’s a spirit that testifies that we’re children of God, and if children, then heirs. What does that mean? That means we’re heirs of the God who spoke the universe into existence and created it! So he’s a powerful God! Is he a God that has a lot? Well, he controls all the cattle on a thousand hills—he controls all the silver and all the gold. Yes, it’s his! He creates universes that we can’t even see without telescopes to go and to explore them.

We think about him. . .is he trustworthy? Yeah! He’s trustworthy! He’s the same yesterday, today and tomorrow! His Word, he says, will never fade away. The grass may fade, the flowers may fade, the grass may wither, but his Word will stand. Sure! He can be trusted!

We think about him! Is He loving? Yes! He defines the very word! This is the God that we are going to have an inheritance from, and we are going to be fellow heirs with Christ! Notice what it says, though: provided we suffer with him. . .”

You may think, “Boy, this Christian life is just supposed to be easy, right?” No! You know, people who preach that prosperity gospel—they just have no foundation in the Bible. You think about the disciples, and all but one of them died a martyr’s death. And the one that didn’t was exiled on the Isle of Patmos so that he could write the book of Revelation.

You think about what the Bible tells you about experiencing tribulation in this world. In John 16:33, Jesus says, “In this world you will have tribulation. But be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.” This text tells us as long as we suffer with him, so that we may be glorified with him, we are not guaranteed a bed of roses in this life because it’s not ultimately about this life!

We will have tribulation, persecution, suffering that we need to experience. We should not expect any more. Our Savior came to this earth and had no place to call his home, nowhere to lay his head. He was spit upon, he was made fun of, he was mocked, he was crucified. He was slapped, he was ridiculed—and yet we should not expect any better.

But we suffer with him, knowing that one day—one day—there will be a glorious day where we will be glorified with him! That the Jesus who got up out of the grave and ascended to the Father and sat down at His right side and said, “It is done! There is no more to do!” He will come again, and not as a babe—he will come again as the glorious ruler! And when we die—if we die before he returns—we will be raised to live with him and enjoy him forever. That’s the God that we worship and we serve!

So, are you living in the power of the Spirit? It’s hard. Easy words, hard to live out. So, how do we, then, have some points of practical application that we take with us? First of all, when that temptation comes, when things happen,

 

  • Recognize that we are in a spiritual war.

 

We understand our sinful nature causes us to flee away from God. We understand there is a spiritual war that takes place. What do we do after we recognize the temptation as a spiritual battle?

 

  • Realize it’s only through the power of the Holy Spirit that we can resist.

It’s not the “I,” “me,” “my” that ends up in “the wretched person that I am.” By the power of the Spirit we put to death the deeds of the flesh. And then, we:

 

  • Rely on God, our Abba Father.

 

The Bible tells us that there is no temptation that’s not common to man—we all experience it. The Bible tells us that there is no temptation that does not have a way of escape, even though it may not feel like it at times. We have a way of escape.

So, when we are in those moments of desperation, of giving in, we cry out to our Abba Father, relying on God, and we say to him, “Lord, help us!” We rely on the power of the Holy Spirit to put to death the deeds of the body. That’s what we do. We recognize it’s a spiritual battle, we realize that only through the power of the Holy Spirit that we can resist, and then we rely on God.

It was about six months after the adoption started that it was finalized. We were in Texas in a notary public’s office, and as we sat there, he was validating that we were who we said we were. We were on the phone, on a conference call, with the judge in Florida, and the judge began to go through this list of—it felt like fifteen minutes—him talking about, “This paperwork is in front of me. When I sign this paperwork, she is yours, whether you like it or not; she is going to be yours on those days when she doesn’t come home on time or when she does things that are wrong.”

He goes through this big list, and I’m sitting there in my own sinful nature—in my own desire to have fun, or whatever. I don’t know what it is. And my response to him, not recognizing that he’s a judge in a robe behind a big desk in Florida, is, “Isn’t that the point of adoption?” He decided that I must be a punk, and I need to hear it all again! He said, “Let me say this again, Mr. White,” and he begins to go through his list of all of these things and what it means for us again.

I recognized that was not a wise response, and after he finished I said to him, “Yes Sir, your Honor, I meant no offense. We are excited to take on this opportunity and challenge. Thank you, Sir!” And he signed the paperwork—stamped it and said, “It is finished! She is your daughter!” I walked out of the room with my wife, and she gave me a hard time about even being able to frustrate judges one-thousand miles away for a little bit.

Later on that day I thought about what had happened, and I thought, “Why did he feel the necessity to do that?” I thought about our society. Far too often we have adopt-a-pet day—and I love pets and treat them like princesses—so I get that. But too many people take them back if they don’t like them, and it’s not something that lasts.

And I think about Cabbage Patch dolls—which come with a certificate of adoption, for us to play with them until Christmas is over and then throw them up on top of a bed, or in a closet, or leave them in a box or do something of that nature. And now they have these new pets out that my daughter received. . .that are birds that will chirp and sing songs and do things that are really goofy in my opinion. They come with a certificate of adoption.

She got one for Christmas, and I saw this little certificate that wasn’t even printed on nice paper—that looked like it would run if it got a little bit wet—and they wanted us to fill out the bird’s name and sign the certificate of adoption—so I promptly, in indignation, shredded that document completely and threw it into the garbage can and made sure that it was squashed down completely as I educated our family more accurately in the ways of the Lord, that that is not adoption!

That bird will be gone next year! That bird has no standing with our family whatsoever! I don’t even like that bird! I bought that bird because it was on your wish list! It is always annoying me, and we are only two hours into this process. This bird will be dead before next year. I will make sure of that—and I don’t know where the bird is now!

Okay, I probably didn’t go that far, but you get the point, right? And I thought to myself, “The reason I responded the way I did is because I understand the theological concept of adoption. . .that once you are in the family of God, you do not get kicked out!”

You know, some of us have earthly fathers, that at some time we take what they have done and we apply that to God as a Heavenly Father, and we don’t understand that earthly fallen fathers are not accurate representations of a perfect Heavenly Father.

If you are here and you struggle with your salvation or you struggle because you didn’t have a godly example of a father, I want you to know that there is a Heavenly Father that loves you with a perfect love. He is a Father that you can trust and you can rely upon, and you do not get kicked out of the family of God! But you have to be in the family first.

So, how do you get in? Repent of my sins, I put my faith and trust in Jesus Christ, plead through the mercy of the cross, tell God that I’m a sinner and I need saving and then I’m adopted into God’s family—declared righteous because I’m united with Christ, and it is just as if I’d never sinned. That’s the beauty of adoption!

Today—how is your heart? Are you in the family of God? He’s a good, good God. He wants you to be in his family. If you’re in the family of God, rest in the assurance that you have a Spirit that lives within you that testifies you are a child of God—and don’t sit on the end of the couch. Live in fellowship with God by putting to death the deeds of the flesh by the power of the Spirit.

Let’s go to the Lord in prayer. God, you are a good, good God and a good, good Father, and Lord, we are thankful to You that we are no longer orphans, but we are children. We are no longer slaves in bondage to sin, but You have set us free. So, Lord, help us to live like it! Help us to live life in the power of the Spirit, help us to live a victorious life, understanding that You are our Heavenly Father and we are Your children. God, help us not to take that for granted, but Lord help us to daily renew our mind, to live a life for Your glory, for Your honor. For it’s in Jesus’ Name that we pray.

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