Some of our friends in America
like Drew Dietz and some of our friends in England like Peter
Manning have passed on their best wishes to you all. So I'm
fulfilling a promise but also I do so with thankfulness. One
of the remarkable privileges of the grace of God is that we
are called the sons of God. I'll just read what John Gill
said about This is a privilege. to be adopted into the family
of God, to be called by God as one of his children. This is
a privilege that exceeds all others. It is better to be a
son than to be a saint. Angels are saints, but not sons.
They are servers. It is better to be a child of
God than to be redeemed, pardoned, and justified. It is great grace
to redeem from slavery, to pardon criminals, and justify the ungodly,
but it is another and a higher act of grace to make them sons,
and which makes them infinitely more honourable than to be the
sons and daughters of the greatest potentate, the greatest king
upon earth. Yea, he gives them an honour
which Adam didn't have in the garden, in his innocence, nor
the angels in heaven, who though sons by creation are yet not
by adoption. To be called a son of God is
the most noble title in heaven or earth. If we are sons, we
should not live like slaves in bondage under the terror of the
law. Let every sinner who believes
on the Son of God constantly enjoy all the privileges of full-grown
sons in the family of God. Soon we shall know fully and
perfectly what Paul meant. when he spoke of the glorious
liberty of the children of God. That's what Paul is doing in
Galatians, isn't he? He's highlighting the extraordinary
privileges of the children of God. They are heirs, they inherit
They are joint heirs with Jesus Christ. All that Jesus Christ
inherits, we inherit together with Him. He talks about this creation being
delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious
liberty of the children of God, Romans 8.21. I just wonder, don't you, we
read psalms like Psalm 40 and you go back through a psalm like
that and you'll find that the psalmist litters the psalm and
litters all the blessings of God with descriptions again and
again of the faithfulness, of the character of God, the character
of our God. And Paul in this letter to the
Galatians is horrified. Horrified that these people to whom the Gospel
came, the Gospel came with power and effectiveness, should actually
be entrapped again. And part of that entrapment is
we no longer see God as a father. We see him as a slave master
ruling over us with a whip rather than a father. He holds his little
ones in his arms and looks upon his children with great, great
delight. Let's go back to Galatians chapter
4 and read again. He says at the end of chapter
3, if you be Christ, if you actually belong to Him, if you are owned
by Him, then you are Abraham's seed. The true seed of Abraham,
the true children of Abraham are not those people who call
themselves Jews today. The true children of Abraham
are the faith children of Abraham, the sons and daughters of God.
Then you are Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise. And now I say that an heir, as
long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though
he be lord of all." When you're a child, you are still just a
servant, even though by right of inheritance all of it might
end up being yours. You're still just a child. This
is how he's describing Jews under the law. But he's under tutors
and governors until the time appointed by the fathers, even
so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements
of the world. But when the fullness of time
was come, it's a lovely phrase to contemplate, isn't it? The fullness of God's time. He calls it in Ezekiel 16, the
time of love. the fullness of time for the
Messiah to come, for the Christ of God to come, the fullness
of time for Him to come into the hearts of His people. When
the fullness of time was come, God sent forth His Son, made
of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under
the law. that we might receive the adoption
of sons. You see, to receive the adoption
of sons, you must have redemption. Redemption is to buy out of,
to buy them back. Two things that are necessary
for redemption. There must be righteousness established,
the righteousness of God established, and there must be justice satisfied. You can read about them in Psalm
40. He owned our sins as His own
and He bore them away and He lived perfect righteousness. We have and we are the righteousness
of God in Him. That we might receive the adoption
of sons. And verse 6 is wonderful, isn't
it? We looked at it briefly last week. You see what it says? It's good to take note of God's
language here to us, isn't it? He says, and because you are
sons, not in order to make you sons, but because you are sons,
God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts. Crying, Abba, Father. Crying, Father, Father. Therefore thou art no more a
servant, and that word is literally slave. You're no longer a slave,
but a son. And if a son, then an heir of
God through Christ. How be it then, when you knew
not God, you Galatians, before you knew God, before you knew
of God's Christ, before He was preached to you, you did service,
you were in slavery, in bondage unto them which are by nature
no gods. There is only one God, says our
Lord. There are no other gods beside
Him. There are no other gods. All
of the others are the figment of man's depraved imagination,
the activities of Satan in this world to blind minds and give
them something else to worship. They are no gods. Allah, Buddha, the 33 or 330
million gods that littered India. Everywhere you cast your eye
in India, whether it's on cars or trucks or mountains or buildings
or shops, everywhere you cast your eye were gods. See what
he describes them here? They're no gods at all. They did service to them. But
now After that you have known God, or rather known of God,
how turn you again to the weak and beggary elements, whereunto
you desire again to be in bondage? I love what that word Begley
means. It means to be impoverished. Weak and Begley. Impoverished. Without any question, the overwhelming
majority of this world we live in lives exactly as Paul has
described them there. If he came back today and looked
across this world, he wouldn't have to change a syllable in
what he wrote in this letter to the Galatians. Some of you, maybe all of you
know what it is like to be, as verse 7 says, to be a slave,
to feel as if worship of God, service of God, the honouring
of our great God and Saviour is but a bondage. The Romans
8, that verse that we quoted, talks about the glorious liberty. It can be translated also as
the liberty of the glory of the sons of God. I don't know about
you, but in my experience the overwhelming majority of people
who profess belief Live like slaves. Live as if they are servants. Live in a spirit of bondage,
as Romans 8.15 says. a spirit of bondage again to
fear. They are fearful, aren't they,
that if they do not do these things to honour God and to serve
God and to look like they're Christians, then God is going
to clobber them. God somehow holds his people
under a covenant of works rather than a glorious covenant of grace. Romans 8.15 says, for you have
not received the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you have received
the spirit of adoption. Spirit of adoption, whereby we
cry, Abba, Father. We cry, Abba, Father. And the
Lord Jesus rose on that glorious resurrection day What did he
say to Mary? He said, you go and tell my brethren
as quickly as you possibly can, Mary. I ascend unto my father
and your father, to my God and your God. It's nothing new, is
it? The Shulamite in the Song of
Solomon. said, even after her great fall, she said, my beloved
is mine, and I am his. My beloved is mine, I belong
to him, and I am his. He belongs to me, and I belong
to him. That's what 3.29 says, isn't
it, in Galatians, if you be Christ, if you belong to Him, you are
owned of God. I love how Ephesians 1, if you
just turn there briefly it's only a page over or so in your
scriptures, Ephesians 1 speaks of this extraordinary, extraordinary
blessedness. He says, Blessed be the God,
verse 3. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be Him who hath blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ,
according as He has chosen us in Him before the foundation
of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before
Him in love. having predestinated us unto
the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself." Adoption involves God's predestination. It involves God's sovereign activity. It's by Jesus Christ. It involves
him bringing people to himself. Adoption of children by Jesus
Christ to himself. As you read in that psalm, I
couldn't help but think of how the Lord Jesus is described in
Isaiah. He says, If I can find it, Isaiah chapter
40 verse 11, it says, he shall feed his flock like a shepherd. He shall gather the lambs with
his arm and he shall carry them. Where does he carry them? He
carries them in his bosom and he leads them. How does he lead
them? and shall gently lead those that are with young. I am poor
and needy, and the Lord thinks upon me, and He carries me."
I just want us to spend some time thinking about the extraordinary
privilege of what it is to be a child of God. and a son, not
a servant, verse 7, but a son. And if a son, an heir of God
through Christ. Adoption is a remarkable thing,
isn't it? In this world, and some of you
here have been adopted, what were you doing when you were
adopted? What was your will? and your choice in it. Adoption
is a beautiful picture, isn't it? A beautiful description of
God publicly confessing and legally entering into a relationship. And as we see that we who are
adopted, you here who are adopted, it's something that you received. Just as in our first birth, we
have no part to play, we are just the recipients. Here in
this second birth and in this adoption, we are again just the
recipients, which is why we receive it. The adoption brings children
out of a spirit of bondage into the glorious liberty of the sons
of God, regenerated, illuminated, justified, sanctified, made partakers
of grace, made to be the inheritors of glory. See, an adoption is
something that we become aware of, isn't it? The Spirit, in
Romans 8 says, witnesses to our spirits. There is a witness going
on. There is something that's known
in the hearts of God's people. Witnesses to their spirits that
they are the children of God. This passage of Galatians is
in many ways a commentary on 1 John 3, and we looked at it
a bit last week. But 1 John 3 says that now we
are, not now that we might be, now we are the sons of God. Sons of God through choosing,
sons of God through loving, isn't it? Behold what manner of love
the Father has bestowed upon us that we should be called the
sons of God. It is the creation of something
which is extraordinarily mysterious and will never be understood
in this world. The world, 1 John 3, the world
knoweth us not. We have family, don't we? We
have friends and people we dearly love who don't know us. They don't understand what motivates
us. They can't understand. our loves
and our desires, they have no comprehension of what moves the
hearts of God's people. The world, the whole world, knoweth
us not, because it knew him not. It has as much understanding
of us as it does of him. There are two things automatically
ought to flow from that. One is that we should be very
understanding of the ignorance of us. It's very hard to criticize
a blind man for not being able to see. There was a lady of your repute
who lived in a big field not too far away from our farm several
years ago and the owner of the farm, they used to drive up and
they used to walk across a pathway into her place. And this fellow
kept driving up there all the time and my friend went up to
him one day and got really, really angry with him. And he said,
why don't you walk across there like the rest of them? And the
man looked at him and said, I can't walk because I don't have any
legs. We can't criticise people who cannot see in that way. Paul is talking to these Galatians,
to people who claim to see. And for those who claim to see
and claim to be teachers, it's a different matter altogether.
You can read about the Lord Jesus rebuking them in John Chapter
8. whose descendants and whose compatriots
are the people here that we are reading about in Galatians, leading
these little ones of Paul's astray, turning a son into a slave, turning
an heir into someone who has to work and earn his place in
God's kingdom. Undoing, undoing all of the grace
of God. And a gospel has gone. If a gospel requires something
of us to do to make it be good news, then it's no longer good
news for the poor and for the needy. It's no longer good news. You're no longer a servant, you're
no longer a slave, but a son, a son of God. How? How do we become sons of
God? It's good just to contemplate,
isn't it? We read about it in Ephesians
1 verse 4. It's love, isn't it? In love,
having predestinated us. God's love is shed abroad in
the way He calls His children to Himself. I do quote Deuteronomy
7, but it's good to ponder it again. Why does the Lord love
us? Why does He says in Deuteronomy chapter
7 verse 6, For thou art unholy people unto the Lord thy God.
The Lord thy God has chosen thee to be a special people unto himself
above all the people that are on the face of the earth. Did he do it because there was
something special in them? The Lord did not set his love
upon you nor choose you because you were more in number than
any people, for you were the fewest of all people." Why does
He shed His love upon His people? But because the Lord loved you
and because He would keep the oath which He had sworn unto
your fathers. He'll keep His promises, which
is what Galatians is talking about, isn't it? He'll keep His
promises. The Lord brought you out with
a mighty hand and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen from
the hand of Pharaoh, king of Egypt. Know therefore that the
Lord thy God, He is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant
and mercy with them that love Him, and keep His commandments. We've
kept them in the Lord Jesus. We are elected, we are adopted
because of divine predestination and God's eternal, unchanging,
everlasting covenant. We are adopted as sons because
of His redeeming love, greater love has no man than this, that
a man lay down his life for his friends." Friends, he calls us,
who he laid down his life for, not slaves and servants. This
was compassion, like a God, that when our Saviour knew, the price
of pardon was His blood, His love, He ne'er withdrew. He has loved me, says Paul, earlier
in Galatians. He has loved me and given Himself
for me. Given Himself for me. Because
He loved us, He assumed our nature. We read about it last week in
Galatians 4.4, made of a woman. He humbled himself to be made
as a man and made under the law. And we read it in Psalm 40, didn't
we? He owned our sins as his own. He owned our guilt as his
own. And he died under the wrath of
God. And he really did put away our
sins forever. We're redeemed. redeemed, brought
back again with the precious blood of a lamb. We are adopted because of God's
effectual saving grace in eternity. Psalm 654 says, blessed is the man thou choosest
and causes to approach unto thee." Those loved of the Father, the
God the Father chooses to save, and those the Father chooses
to save, the Son redeemed, and the Holy Spirit caused by effectual,
irresistible grace. I love what verse 6 says, isn't
it? He sent forth God in sovereign mercy and grace. He sent forth
the Spirit of His Son into your hearts. The idea that God could say those
things and then fail for that spirit to be effective in doing
the things He's promised to do. He takes the things of the Lord
Jesus. What are the things of the Lord
Jesus? Who He is in eternity. God our
Saviour. God the Son. Who He is. in redemptive history throughout
time, the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world, who
He is in all of the promises, all of the promises of the revelation
of the character of God, all of the promises revealed in the
saving of His people, all of what He is. in Gethsemane's garden,
all of what he is on Calvary's hill. He takes those things and
he reveals them to us. He makes them known to us in
our hearts. He takes this word that is before
us, that seems for us so often dull and lifeless, and all of
a sudden he shines a light on it and a verse sparkles. It sparkles with truth. It sparkles with the character
of God. It sparkles with truth about
who we are. It sparkles with promises of
who we are as God's children. If you are sons, God sent forth
the Spirit. Because you are sons, not if
you are sons, because you are sons, God sent forth the Spirit
of His Son into your heart, crying, Abba, Father. We are sons preserved. Preserved and protected. And this Galatian letter is part
of God's providential and preserving care of these in this church
who are his children. And as I said before, this letter
brought a division in that church. I can just imagine those Pharisee
legalists fuming as Paul wrote these words about the law, the
law that they were upholding. And I can imagine the children
of God thinking, I was nearly there. He's brought
me up out of the pit again. I was entangled and ensnared
and God in love and mercy sent Paul before me to stop me. He hedges the way of His people,
and if He hedges them with thorns, it's a good thing for us. Those
who are the sons of God bear the chastening hand of our God,
as Hebrews says. It may not seem pleasant at the
time, but what choice is there? to not have his chastening hand
upon us and be allowed to go our own way or to have him as
a father intervene, intervene again in his life. His preservation care, his protecting
care, his watching over us. Adoption. We are adopted. We are by birth sons of Adam. We are by birth fallen and depraved
and spiritually dead. And Ephesians 2 says that we
were in bondage, in shocking bondage. You walked according,
chapter 2 verse 2, according to the course of this world.
You walked there. I walked there. Everyone has
walked there. Those who say they've always
been Christians are not Christians yet. You walk there according
to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now
worketh in the children of disobedience, among whom also we had our conversation
in times past. In the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling
the desires of the flesh and of the mind, There are desires
that are intellectual desires, as well as desires of the flesh,
and were by nature the children of wrath. We were wrathful towards
God and we were deserving of His wrath. And we cannot think
that somehow we were better than them, even as others. That's why it is beautiful the
way Paul builds in this letter and builds to these crescendos
where he has the opportunity to proclaim the Gospel. He shows
what darkness is and he shows what light is. And he wants us
to see, brothers and sisters, he wants us to see again and
again what is the glorious liberty of the children of God. He promises this adoption. He promises that they'll call
on him in Jeremiah 3.19. He says, How shall I put thee
among the children and give thee a pleasant land and a goodly
heritage of the host of the nations? And I said, Thou shalt call me
thy father. Thou shalt call me my Father,
and shalt not turn away from me." Paul wants us to see the extraordinary
privilege and the glorious liberty of the children of God. We are
adopted not because of anything that we have done. We are adopted
not because of anything we will do or might do. I love 1 Corinthians
4, 7. Who makes you to differ? If you
think that you are different from someone else, who maketh
thee to differ from another? And what hast thou that thou
didst not receive? What do you have? What do you
have spiritually in this world in any way? What did you have
that you have not received? Now if thou didst receive it,
why dost thou glory?" You just received it as a gift. Why do
you glory as if you'd earned it? Why dost thou glory as if
thou has not received it? We are adopted into his family. He gives his Spirit. To give
his Spirit is to give us God himself. Kings and priests unto
God. We are adopted as sons. I love what 1 John says, it's
just so interesting. A friend of mine quoted a bit
of it the other day. It's amazing how this verse in
1 John 1.12 is one of those verses that is so misused that all you
have to do is read it. and it becomes glorious and gloriously
true. Verse 12 of John 1 says, But
as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become sons
of God, even to them that believe on his name, which were born
not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will
of man, but of God." They're born of God, not of blood,
not because of some activity of men. The birth, the new birth brings
new life, a new life to believe on his name. To believe on his
name is to believe on his character, is to believe him as he describes
himself in the scriptures, to receive him to receive Him as
Lord, to receive Him as He describes Himself, as Redeemer, as Saviour,
as Lord, is to trust Him for all our righteousness, to believe
what He says about the fact that He is all of our sanctification
and redemption, to believe that He is everything for us before
God. And it means that they are given
the right and the power and the authority and the privilege of
being His child. Galatians 3.26 says, isn't it? For you are all children of God
by faith in Christ Jesus. See, Paul had known what it was. to be a slave. The remarkable thing about those
who are in bondage to slavery is that they have no idea that
they're slaves. One of the Pharisees say to the
Lord Jesus in John chapter 8, we've never been in bondage to
anyone. They were in bondage to Pharaoh
for 430 years, they were in bondage to the Babylonians, they were
in bondage to the Assyrians and to almost every nation around.
They were in bondage to the Babylonians for 70 years and now they are
in bondage to the Romans. Such is the deceptive nature
of spiritual legal righteousness that they think they are free
and yet they are slaves. These people who came to Galatia
thought as much as the Pharisees about their righteousness and
their works, but what was more dangerous about it was that they
added some sort of service and some sort of lip worship to the
Lord Jesus in the midst of it. Paul wants these people to know
what it is to be the sons of God. It's interesting as I went
through Galatians chapter 3 and the first bit of chapter 4, all
of these verses up here that are highlighted in yellow speak
of faith, talks of faith. And then in this section here,
all of the ones that are highlighted in whatever it is, red of some
sort. They're all to do with the promises.
He goes from faith to the promises of God and then down here in
this section he starts talking about what it is to be the children
of God. He can't believe that they have
turned from faith, turned from promises and turned from being
children. So quickly he's astonished that
they would take up servitude again. But such is the deception
of legalistic righteousness that they think like the Pharisees
that they've never been slaves. He wants to remind them the blessings
of sonship. You're no more, verse 7, you're
no more a slave, no more a servant, but a son, and if a son, then
an heir of God through Christ. Let's just look briefly at some
of the blessings of being a son, some of the blessings of adoption.
There is an assured interest for the children of God in the
fact that God loves them. If God loves me, that's all I
need for time and eternity. He loves his people infinitely,
eternally, unchangeably, graciously, everlastingly. He loves his people. He loves his people in a way
so similar to his love to his dear son. to have the blessings
of adoption is to have the Spirit of His Son in our hearts. And
what did the Lord Jesus pray on that great night of His crucifixion? He said, I in them and thou in
me, that they may be made perfect in one, that the world may know
that thou hast sent me and hast loved them as thou hast loved
me. Father, I will that they also
whom Thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they may
behold my glory which Thou hast given me. For Thou lovest me
before the foundation of the world, O righteous Father. The
world has not known Thee, but I have known Thee, and these
have known that Thou hast sent me. and I have declared unto
them thy name." He has declared unto them the character of God. All of the fullness of the character
of the Godhead was there in our Lord Jesus Christ. I have declared
unto them thy name and will declare it that the love wherewith thou
hast loved me may be in them, and I in them." Just listen to
those words of our Saviour again. You see, salvation is knowing
God in His true character as He reveals Himself to His people. I have declared unto them thy
name." He's declared the character of God, manifested the character
of God and he will declare it, he continues to declare it. That
and the result of this declaration, the result of this revealing
is that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them
and I in them. the glorious liberty of the children
of God. The Spirit of God, in answer
to that prayer, lives and abides in God's children. So that's
Paul's anxiety, isn't it, in Galatians? Because he does, I
believe, feel that there are children of God amongst them.
And what's he waiting for? What's he longing for? He says,
I'm in travail. I'm in travail until Christ,
4 verse 19, my little children of whom I travail in birth again. He's like a mother expecting
a child. He's anxious and he's looking
forward until Christ be formed in you. And he says at the end
of the letter, for in Christ Jesus circumcision doesn't avail
anything. Circumcision, activities under
the law achieve nothing. And uncircumcision, the works
of the Gentiles, nothing, but a new creature, a new creation
born of God. The children of God are new creatures
and they are sealed. They are sealed with that Holy
Spirit of promise. They are guaranteed an inheritance. It's Christ who is our inheritance. It's Christ in you who is the
hope of glory. The Spirit of His Son is sent
into the hearts of His children As I said earlier, the adopted
sons have the blessing of the chastening hand of our God. The adopted sons have the promise
of being made like Christ, Romans 8, 29. Remarkable promises, isn't
it? For whom He did foreknow, He
did also predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son. that
he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, whom
he did predestinate, them he also called, whom he called,
them he also justified, whom he justified, them he also glorified."
What shall we say? What should the response of the
children of God? If God be for us, if you are
an adopted child, God is for you. You get between me and my
children, especially when they are little and around, And I
went from being a wimp into a raging lion. Our God is a bigger and
better and more faithful father than I ever, ever was. Touch
not mine anointed, he says. Do my prophets no harm. He watches
over his people as a jealous God. Jealous for those who are
his. We have the promise of being
made like Christ, and we have the promise of being heirs. See, what shall you say? You
have saved God before us, who can be against us? Romans 8.32.
He who spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all,
all of us who are his sons, how shall he not with him freely
give us all things? As we see, we are heirs of God,
Galatians 4.7, an heir of God, not through anything we've done,
an heir of God through Christ. We have an inheritance. We spoke a little bit about it
last week, but I love how Peter describes it. He says, to an
inheritance incorruptible. It can't be corrupted, my inheritance. incorruptible, undefiled. You can't defile my inheritance. And my inheritance fadeth not
away, and my inheritance is kept in a really special place. It's
reserved in heaven for you. We are blessed, as Ephesians
1 says, with all spiritual blessings. all spiritual lessons. We lack
nothing. We are made fit, we are made
qualified to be the partakers of the inheritance of the saints
in life. All things are awaiting the children
of God. All things are theirs right now. Therefore they are before the
throne, Revelation 7.15, Therefore they are before the throne of
God, and serve him night and day in his temple. And he that
sitteth on the throne shall dwell among them, and they shall hunger
no more, neither thirst any more, neither shall the sun light on
them, nor any heat, because the lamb which is in the midst of
the throne shall feed them. and shall lead them into living
fountains of waters, and God shall wipe away all tears from
their eyes." He says of the Jews in time past that they have committed
two sins, haven't they? My people have committed two
evils. They have forsaken me. This is
what the Galatians have done. They have forsaken me, the fountain
of living waters, and hewed out cisterns. They dug a hole in
the ground to hold their water. Broken cisterns that can hold
no water. Adopted children have a new name. Norm and Simon were given new
names, legally given new names. The name that God's children
wear is that remarkable name, isn't it? In Jeremiah he says,
It's the name of God and it's the name by which she shall be
named. You're no longer a slave, but
a son. no longer under tutors, no longer
under the law. To go back under the law is to
go from being a son to a slave, and if you stay there, you'll
be involved in what Paul says are weak and beggarly elements. They're powerless and they're
impoverished. They can't give life, they can't
give righteousness, they can't give joy, they can't give peace,
they can't give salvation, they can't give hope. People are just
left looking at themselves. And they have, according to Colossians
2.23, they have a show of wisdom in will worship and in humility. They will look to be humble and
neglecting of the body, and they have no value whatsoever in curbing
self-indulgence. In fact, to turn from the gospel
of grace and to turn to law-keeping is to turn away from Christ and
to have absolutely nothing. It's to turn back to where the
Galatians were prior to hearing the Gospel at all. Weak and beggarly
elements. I want, by the grace of God,
to know again and again the privilege of being a child of God. I want
to know that God is my Father and God is for me. I want to feel and experience
and to just simply trust what He says about His dear Son. I don't want to be turned, nor
do I want to turn anyone, back to the activities of the flesh.
I want to live as Abraham did. He lived on the promises of God. His life was to live. He staggered not at the promise
of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith. He just
simply trusted what God said, giving glory to God, being fully
persuaded that what He had promised, He also was able to perform. Is He able to be the sanctifier
and to be the sanctification of His people? He is able. Our God is able. Let's finish
with a beautiful verse from Isaiah 54.10. For the mountains shall
depart and the hills be removed. But my kindness shall not depart
from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed,
saith the Lord that has mercy on thee." May he have mercy on
us that we might again and again enjoy something of the children of God. Therefore
you are no more a slave, no more a servant, but a son. And if
a son, then an heir of God through Christ. Let's pray.