Such a treat to be with you guys today and we're going through
Romans chapter 8. How lucky that I get to jump
onto that journey you guys are in.
And the first time in the book of Romans the word Father is
mentioned is in today's verses. Now I know Father is a big theme
in three CI all around the country and probably the world.
When people speak about who has a revelation of God as Father,
the name Rory will be mentioned. And no doubt you guys have lived
in the wonderfulness of that emphasis.
So what a treat to preach on something.
I'm speaking to the choir. I'm speaking to the choir.
I've got faith today. Two things, everyone of you who
are new to church or back in church after a long time, today
is your homecoming. Not a single one leaves this
place estranged from God. And secondly, that everyone of
us, maybe for the first time, maybe for the 100th time,
experiences a fresh infilling of the Father's presence and Holy
Spirit coming into your life. So we're going to do that at the
end, but everything I say will lead to that.
It's not just Rory that loves God, his father.
It's one of the great themes of my life, your life, no doubt.
My dad died when I was 36 years old, sorry, when he was 36 years
old. I was only 15.
And my dad, I'd lived with him for five years, that my parents
got divorced when they were young.
He died of HIV, AIDS, one of the first hundred in the country to
die of that horrible disease. And the last five years my
brother and I lived with him in Seaport in Cape Town.
He supported our skateboarding, our surfing, he showed us the
zest for life. Just such a fantastic person to
have into our in our lives. And when he passed away we felt
such a void of his presence. I was truly fatherless.
The world felt much scarier. It was this deep, painful loss
that cut through the superficiality of my life,
because before he died, I think I'd just live for girls and
parties and surfing. But suddenly I'm wondering what
life and death are, really. About six months after my dad
died, I heard the gospel of God's love for me.
I grabbed onto it with open arms.
My only Christian friend. I just had one Christian friend.
But that's enough to find your way to heaven.
My only Christian friend invited me to a camp organized by his
church, where I heard for the first time that I'm loved by God
the way a good parent loves their child.
And I discovered a Heavenly Father whose ways of love swept
into my life like a high tide, filling the gap left by my
father's absence. What a joy to have God as my
father. And now I'm a father, too.
Julie and I tried for a year and a half to fall pregnant with no
luck. And then Julie went for a prayer
walk, came back and said God just told me we're going to have
four children. He said what?
And then and then we tried for one and there was an early
miscarriage. We were broken.
And then came Eli. He came into the world and I
remember the thrill of a child being born, the fresh
realization that we are mammals. If you ever witnessed a birth,
it's like you can't have imagined that we live in another
world. We are mammals.
This human comes out of our ass body and a child is born.
I remember going home late that night and starting to weep and
something happened that I did not expect.
Not only was a child born, but a father was born.
I remember just weeping. I remember accessing God is
father in a new way because I'd lost a father.
Now I had a father, but to be a father, I suddenly felt
something of God's love for me, for you.
My wife said to me last night, Darren, don't perform for those
people. Ask God to feel his Father's
heart for them and look at me. I'm I'd love you guys and pray.
Gosh, where was I? OK, so comes Eli then, then
Finn, then Ivy, then I said to Julie, let's try for 1/4.
She says no, we're done. I said, but God told you that
we're going to have 1/4. She said, you know you must re
evaluate prophetic words according to God's character.
God would never be so cruel as to give us a fourth.
She was dead serious a few months later, 1 lucky night for
me, Valentine's night, true story, Valentine's night and we
fall pregnant with and then Julie goes off and I didn't even
go to the Ghani with her for that first 12 week scan.
She comes back, she says Taryn, we're not going to have a child.
I was broken. We're going to have two.
So now I'm thinking, Oh my gosh, maybe God never spoke.
We've just been breathing like rabbits because that's more than
four. So I go into the garden and I
the world is spinning like this and I say, God speak to me.
Something's gone wrong. And honestly, I feel the Holy
Spirit just say one word to me. Surprise, that was what he said
to me. Let me read today's passage,
Romans 8 verse 14. For those who are led by the
Spirit of God are the children of God.
The Spirit you receive does not make you slaves so that you live
in fear again. Rather you have received the
spirit of adoption, and by him, by the Spirit we cry, ABBA,
Father, the Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that
we are God's children. Now if we are children, then we
are also heirs, heirs of God and coheirs with Christ.
So this passage speaks about 3 gifts.
The Father gives us the gift of identity, the gift of infilling,
and the gift of inheritance. And I had wanted to speak on all
three, but last night Matt in the car as he was driving me
from the airport said, you know, I find the best messages only
make one or two points. So I took it as a sign.
I dropped my Third Point and I leave it to the next lucky
preacher to speak about the gift of inheritance.
I want to speak to you about the gift of identity and the gift of
infilling. I heard two weeks ago, Rory,
saying that the that Romans is like the Himalayas of the Bible.
Well, if that's the case, then Romans 8 is Everest.
But what's the 8844 meter peak? We're standing on it.
Verses 14 to 17 for those who are led by the Spirit of God or
the children of God. In context, this means that if
you're a child of God, then you can expect the Spirit to lead
you towards godliness and liveliness.
The Spirit will prompt us to walk in the ways of Jesus.
He won't force us, but He will nudge us.
He might restrain us and there might even be times when He
guides us in our decision making.
True story, five years ago, it's COVID.
I'm busy writing a 30 day devotional in Romans chapter 8.
I get to verses 14 and 17 and it's exploding for me and I have
this thought get hold of Rory and say that you will offer this
teaching to his church on verses 14 to 17.
This is a very weird thought because if some pastor gets hold
of me, hey, I want to teach your church.
God told me I'll just go. That's sweet, but no thank you.
So now I'm doing the awkward thing.
So I said to Rory, Rory absolutely no problem.
It might sound weird, but I honestly feeling God nudgement
took me two days to act on it and at first he's interested,
but then we kind of lose comms and afters I'm a bit
embarrassed. What was I doing offering to
teach his church? Romans 8 verses 14 to 17.
So a few months ago Rory said, Hey, come invite, invite me to
preach this day. What are we preaching on?
Oh, you in Romans 8? So now I'm watching where am I
going to step in? Lo and behold, Rory gets to
verse 13. So today turns out I heard God
right. I just got the timing wrong.
Five years. But think how meticulous God has
been planning today that you would be here to hear this
message. So let's speak about the
Father's gift of identity. The Father's gift of identity,
Who am I? This is the question that runs
deep in every one of us. Some people say it's the
question of our generation. For many of us, our first
instinct is to locate our identity in what we do.
Ask someone who are you? And soon they're telling you I'm
a teacher, I'm an entrepreneur, I'm a stay at home mom.
And yet, if we lose that role or success doesn't come, who are we
then? Others.
Others of us build our identity on what we've done, or rather on
what we wish we hadn't done. Past failures, rejections,
mistakes can cling to us like a second skin, whispering shame
over and over. Then there's what others think
of us, how easily our sense of worth rises or falls on
someone's approval, someone's criticism, someone's
indifference. It's like to like trying to
stand on quicksand. There's no firm ground beneath
us. All of these are flawed places
to find an identity. They can't hold the weight of
who you are. And this is where Romans 8
brings us the most breath taking gift through Christ.
We are adopted as children of God.
The Spirit you receive brought about your adoption to sonship
by him we cry. ABBA Father, your deepest
identity is not what you do for a living.
It's not the mistakes you've made.
It's not what anyone thinks of you.
Your truest identity is child of God.
So let me say two things about this adoption and ABBA adoption.
Firstly, what I heard when I was 16 years old and it came as a
surprise, not everyone is God's adopted child.
I just assumed all people are God's child.
But for my 1st 16 years, I certainly didn't know God
intimately. You see, it's a half truth that
we are all God's children. Yes, God is the Creator of all
of us. We're all made in His image.
We're all loved. It's why Paul in the Bible
speaking to Pagan says we are his offspring.
But being adopted into God's family is a deeper, more
intimate connection. As John the Apostle explains to
those who received Jesus and believed in his name, he gave
them the right to become children of God.
And how do we become children of God?
Well, amazingly, the Son of God became one of us so we can
become sons and daughters of God.
The Son of God became one of us so that we could become sons and
daughters of God. Galatians 4 says when the time
had fully come, God sent his Son that we might receive the full
rights of sons. But how exactly did Jesus make
us sons and daughters? Well, interestingly, if you read
the gospels, only once does Jesus call his disciples
brothers and sisters. It's on the day of his
resurrection when he tells one of the women, Go instead to my
brothers and tell them, I'm sending to my father and to your
father, to my God and your God. It's only after his death and
his resurrection that Jesus speaks of the disciples
adoption. Hebrews 2 says that he tasted
death in our place to bring many sons and daughters to glory.
It's as though on the cross he became an orphan so that we
could become adopted and then we get brought into this cosmic
relationship with the Father and the Son.
There's only another place in the book of Romans where God is
called Father in Romans 15 verse 6, where it speaks about God as
the Father of Jesus. These are the highest truths.
The Son is the Son of the Father.
The Son calls the Father his father, and we get brought into
that relationship. So we also have God as our
Father. But notice that in John 20,
Jesus doesn't say our Father. He says my Father and your
Father. Why the awkward language?
Well, our relationship with God as his children is a bit
different from Jesus's unique status as God's Son.
I mean, He is divine, we are not.
He is worshipped, we are worshippers.
His sonship has existed from eternity past to eternity
future. Our sonship and daughtership
will exist to eternity future, but it has a starting point.
He is the Son by nature. We are sons and daughters by
grace. We are His adopted brothers and
sisters. What we do share in common with
our older brother, however, is that the Father loves us as much
as He loves His Son. John 17 verse 23.
Jesus is praying and he says, Father, you have loved them even
as you have loved me. Read the Gospels.
Read of God's overwhelming, startling, intense love for his
Son. All of that affection that He
has for His Son, He has for you. And let's talk about ABBA.
The Spirit enables us to enjoy intimate access to the Father.
By him we cry ABBA, father. ABBA is the Aramaic word for
father affectionately used by little children.
It's similar to Papa, Daddy and Jesus 1st called God ABBA in
Mark 14. Imagine how this shocked the
disciples, because we know of no place before where anybody had
spoken to God so endearingly to call him ABBA.
Small children of all cultures tend to latch onto these two
syllable names for their parents.
Always each child comes and you want to know if they're going to
say Dada or Mama. First, the competition starts.
Or OPA. Oh my, yes, more competition.
These two syllable names, they imply implicit trust dependency.
But when we cry have a father, it's not only a cry of
dependency, it's also a cry of wonder.
The Apostle John beautifully models this in his letter 1 John
3 verse 1. He says, See what great love the
Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children,
for that is what we are. See what great love the Father
has lavished upon us, that we should be called children, for
that is what we are. The word see can be translated.
Behold, could be translated. Wow.
It's an exclamation mark at the beginning of the sentence and
then the translation. What great love?
Translators struggle with this because in the original Greek it
says, see what country does this love come from?
It's an ancient idiom. It's beyond the range of your
experience. In the ancient world, if
something happened that nobody had ever seen, they'd say what
country. It's like saying, what planet
does this love come from? See what planet is this love?
The Father has lavished upon us that we should be called
children of God, and that is what we are.
Christianity, alone among the the the major religions,
emphasizes this parent child intimacy between God and
ourselves. Islam does not believe God is a
father. I remember reading the
biography. I dared to call him Father,
telling of a Muslim woman who started to read the Bible
alongside the Koran. As she realized the essential
message of these two books was incompatible, she prayed to pray
God, which is your book. And she said she heard a voice
saying, the book by which you call me Father is my book.
As a as as a human species, we are enamoured with famous and
powerful people, celebrities, presidents.
And what makes them so awe inspiring is that you can't get
to them because they're surrounded by security fences
and by bodyguards. Now picture this ancient setting
where you've got a king seated on his throne and he's caught
everybody standing to attention. If anybody steps out of line,
they can be executed. Complete fear.
And then suddenly there's the banging of a door, someone
running down the whatever that is and jumping onto the the the
King Daddy in the gospel, the most important person not only
in the world, but the universe is in reach.
He is ever available. He's not too important or too
busy or too distracted for us. His door is always open.
We simply cannot interrupt him from something more important he
may be doing, for his chief work is to love his children.
Point 1.2 Matt, you're keeping counts.
My I got one more point. The Father's gift of infilling.
What will satisfy me?
Every human heart is asking the same quiet question.
We may, we're not say it aloud, but we feel it and we go on
searching. Some of us think if we can just
find the right person, if I can experience that perfect romantic
love, then I will be whole. Others think if I can succeed or
make more money or gain that recognition, then I'll finally
rest this chase after pleasure or experiences or friendships or
family or even ministry. Good things, but not ultimate
things. But here's the tragedy.
Every well we dig in this world world will eventually run dry.
The career high fades, the relationship disappoints, the
thrill wears off Why? Because our hearts are too deep
to be filled by creative things. How wonderful then, that the
Spirit Himself testifies with our Spirit that we are God's
children. This is a reference to the
infilling of the Holy Spirit. Now, if you were to read the
book of Acts, there's many references to the outpouring and
the baptism and the infilling of the Holy Spirit.
Always these experiences are meant to empower a person or a
community for the ministry impact that they're going to
have, and Paul certainly believes that.
But what Paul contributes to this understanding of this
experience of this outpoured presence of God is it's not just
powerful ministry. It comes packed with a
supernatural assurance and supernatural affection.
Supernatural assurance and supernatural affection.
So let's speak about the assurance the Spirit's infilling
gives us assurance. Bible scholars studying Romans 8
debate what is the main idea that holds together Romans 8.
Some say, well, obviously it's the Holy Spirit.
It's referred to 18 times. But others go, no, no, it's not.
It's not the Holy Spirit. It's assurance because the
opening verse you've heard many Times Now over the last many
months is no condemnation, and the last verse is no separation.
So which is it? Well, verse 16 solves our
problem. It's both.
In verse 16, these two things converged.
The Spirit gives us everlasting assurance.
The Spirit himself might want to underline that Word himself.
The Spirit is a person. You know, often hear myself and
others speak about the Spirit, isn't it?
Could you feel it? And there are many metaphors
that are impersonal. The spirit's presence is like
wind, like water, like fire, like wine.
So we the perpetuates this idea. But Paul says no, no, he throws
in the word himself. The Spirit is a person.
The Spirit is not just a language.
Have you ever received the gift of tons?
The Spirit is not just a leading.
Many people will just be happy. That's all.
The Holy Spirit is to them. A once remarkable thing that
happened with their mouth or many times or they get little
nudges. That's it.
Now, the Spirit is a person that you have a love relationship
with, so you get to know God is your Father.
There's a love relationship there.
You get to know God the Son, there's a love relationship
there, and you get to know the Holy Spirit.
You get to have a love relationship with the Holy
Spirit. Now let's speak about assurance,
because let's be honest, it doesn't.
Even if you've been a Christian for a long time, it doesn't
always feel like God is near. Sometimes your prayers bounce
off the feeling, the ceiling. That's what it feels like.
So what do you do? What do you do?
Well, the first thing that I really want to suggest is that
you testify to yourself that you are God's child.
The word testify in verse 16 is legal language that speaks of
speaking the truth in such a way that doubt is castaway.
Now one of the things I could not believe when I studied this
verse 16 is that I'd read it wrong.
All these years. I've always read it as the
Spirit himself testifies to our Spirit that we are God's
children. And yet it actually says the
Spirit himself testifies with. It's the Greek word sane SYN,
which means alongside there are two testifying to you that
you're God's child. There's the Spirit and there's
your spirit, which is a good reminder, your job to remind
yourself that you're God's child.
Even when you don't feel it, you remind yourself of it.
And it's not just words you have have to hold onto.
God has demonstrated his love by allowing his Son to die in our
place. Maybe every day you look
yourself in the mirror. You say it might feel like God
has abandoned you, but he hasn't.
Might feel like he's rejected you or ignored you.
Not true. He will never leave you.
He's with you. Now, I'm not saying feelings are
unimportant. They are.
But what I'm saying is that they're not the best guides to
reality. Emotions always feel real, but
they're not always based on reality.
After two decades of marriage, if I based my relationship with
Julie on feelings, I think I'd have ruined it.
Imagine me saying, Julie, I just don't feel close to you right
now. I don't even think we married.
Testify to yourself that you're God's child, but thank goodness
you're not to do it alone. The Spirit himself also
testifies that you're God's child.
In Scripture, there's the principle of two witnesses to
confirm a matter. So there's this picture that
Paul is painting of us testifying to ourselves about
God's love for us, but somehow the jury is not sure.
In walks a new defense witness. The Spirit who settles settles
the matter decisively. Paul is speaking about the
infilling or outpouring of the Holy Spirit in Romans 5, verse
5, some chapters before Speaking of the same experience.
He says God pours out his love in our hearts by the Holy Spirit
whom He has given us. So there he's speaking about
this, these times when he becomes supernaturally aware of
God's love. Now he's giving it more
definition. We're also experiencing the
Father's intimate embrace and affection.
But let me just speak about these experiences.
There are times when the Holy Spirit supernaturally convinces
you that you are loved. He takes you beyond the fact of
your love to the feeling of the love.
You might believe something, but we move from believing it to
knowing it. Doctrine becomes dynamite.
There's an immediacy about it. God's presence and power become
an almost tangible reality. Our spiritual senses are
supercharged with the nearness and the goodness of God.
The Bible has all kinds of names for this experience.
Baptism or engulfing times of refreshing streams of living
water, inexpressible joy, tasting the powers of the coming
age. We cannot generate these
experiences. God chooses these moments.
Sometimes they come upon us when we least expect them.
Other times we're asking for more of God's presence in our
lives and the answers and these experiences vary in intensity.
Sometimes they come with the gentleness of a dove, other
times with Pentecost, like fire and wind.
But we can ask for them. We're going to do that at the
end of our time together. And then let me speak about
affection. Affection, I remember I'm
studying the father in Jesus, prodigal of the returning
prodigal son. The son's returning home, the
Father's Day. He stands up.
He runs to the son, filled with compassion for his son, and
embraces his son. I remember going that word
embrace. Where else is it used in the
Bible? EPI Pepto?
Amazingly, I find in Acts Chapter 11, Peter is preaching
to Cornelius and his family, and he says that as he preached to
them, the spirit EPI Pepto fell upon them.
The Father fell upon the returning son, and the Father
falls upon you, embracing you. A couple came to faith in the
church that I lead, and a few weeks later she said to me,
something amazing happened in the meeting today.
I was standing there and I think the Holy Spirit gave me a hug.
An analogy might help.
The child knows that her dad loves her.
You know, dad kisses on her forehead at night, says good
night to her. He's always around, but one day
the father and the daughter, Sunday afternoon, going for a
walk next to the lake. And then the father stops and
daughter wonders what's happening.
And the father bends down and scoops up his daughter and holds
her to his chest, squeezes her and whispers in her ear, I love
you, you are mine, I am yours, I'm so proud of you.
Just holds her there. The daughter is not learning
anything new. She knew her father loved her,
but she's feeling a deeper inside.
It's going in the Holy Spirit is able to communicate to the
depths our be of our being, the intensity and the reality of
God's love for us and and the Spirit's infilling is not just
God's assurance. It's, it's an experience of God
delighting in US. When Jesus was baptized, he
comes out of the water and it says that the voice came from
heaven as his, the spirit came upon him saying, this is my son
whom I love, with whom I am well pleased.
God's pleasure in him, God's pleasure in him.
I've got a friend who's an acclaimed artist.
He's been a Christian his whole life and he says that his
parents sent him to boarding school when he was six.
He knew that he they loved him, but they didn't find much joy in
him. And he says this affected his
relationship with God. He thinks that when he's
praying, he's annoying God. One of the most important
spiritual journeys of his life is the discovery that God
doesn't just put up with him. God doesn't just love him, God
delights in him, says Lewis preached what they call his most
famous ever sermon, The Weight of Glory.
What is this glory he refers to? It's the glorious knowledge that
God delights in me, that I make God happy just because I'm his
child, says Lewis writes. To please God, to be a is to
please God, to be a real ingredient in God's happiness,
to be loved by God, not merely pitied but delighted in the same
way an artist delights in his work, or a father and his son.
It seems impossible, a weight or a burden of glory that our
thoughts can hardly sustain. But so it is Andrew Murray and
Abide in Christ captures this perfectly as one of His redeemed
works. You are His delight.
All His desire is towards you with the longing of a love
stronger than death, and which many waters cannot quench.
His heart yearns after you, seeking your fellowship and your
love. Were it needed, He could die
again to possess you. As the Father loved the Son and
could not live without Him, could not be God the blessed
without Him, so Jesus loves you. His life is bound up in yours.
You are to inexpressibly more precious than you can ever know
and then a more contemporary writer, Peter Pete Gregg, who
heads up the 24/7 prayer movement speaks about what a
game changer it is to live in the reality that we are
delighted in by God. He says the most important
discovery you will ever make is the the love the Father has for
you. Your power in prayer will flow
from the certainty that the one who made you delights in you.
He's not scowling at you, He's on your side.
And then he says unless your mission and your acts of mercy
begin and end in the knowledge of the Father's love, you will
always act and pray out of desperation, determination and
duty instead of revelation, expectation and joy.
It's a game changer. And then two more things the
fact and experience of God's love means one, we are no longer
slaves to fear and secondly, we're no longer enemies of God.
We're no longer slaves to fear. When Paul says that the Spirit
does not make you slaves so that you live in fear, again, he's
saying that you no longer need to live under the crushing
weight of fear. Fear of punishment, fear of
rejection, fear of the unknown, fear of abandonment.
The these fears once held you captive.
They they subconsciously dictated your choices, but they
are rendered powerless. In their place.
God pours out his perfect love and love so deep and unwavering
that it dissolves every shadow of fear.
Fear loses its grip not because now we must the courage on our
own, but because we are embraced by our Father, whose affection
is constant and unshakable. Julie and I are plant with five
children into our planting a church next year.
We're walking away from a fantastic church.
I can tell you why we're doing it.
It came from supernatural experiences of gods in folding
presence, whereas filled with such a sense of His abundance
that doing this just seemed so obvious and natural.
Earlier this year, I was in a time of quite a bit of turmoil,
and I remember someone praying for me.
And as they're praying for me, the Spirit of God came upon my
body. I never fall down, but I fell
backwards and I lay on the ground and I heard God just say
to me, he said, look at you all worried about subtraction and
division, like my life is getting smaller, all worried
about subtraction and division when my word over you is
addition and multiplication. Stand up after that, you're a
different person. I know I could have gone to a
psychologist 20 times. They couldn't have produced that
inner abundance that the Spirit of God does in US.
What about you? What fears are holding you back
from doing something exciting with your one and only life?
And secondly, we're no longer enemies of God.
We're no longer enemies of God. The movie Blood Diamond sheds
light on the brutal war world of conflict diamonds.
Have you seen Blood Diamond? During Sierra Leone's 1999 Civil
War, there's this powerful scene.
Danny Archer. That's Leonardo DiCaprio and
Solomon Vandy Jim on Hansu. They're digging for a buried
diamond and they're surrounded by a battlefield of dead bodies.
Back story, Solomon has been looking for his son, who years
before had been kidnapped, abused, and forced into being a
child soldier. Spoiler alert, as they dig deer
is Solomon's son suddenly appears, gun in hand, ready to
kill the two men. He has forgotten his father's
own face. One way the Bible tells the
story of humanity is the story of forgetting who we are.
Adam and Eve once lived in physical sunlight, but they also
lived in the spiritual and emotional light of God's love.
They knew who they were, children of God, image bearers.
But then Satan's life cast a shadow on their hearts by
planting the idea that God was withholding something from them.
He made them dot. They were loved, and then they
and and we were kidnapped by that lie.
Forgetting who we were, we surrendered more and more to
darkness, even taking up arms against God.
Back to the movie Blood Diamond. How do you defuse such a moment,
child? Salt is about to blow your
brains out. Solomon speaks calmly.
You are dear Vandy of the proud mended tribe.
You are a good boy who loves soccer and school.
Your mother loves you so much she waits by the fire with your
sister and the new baby. The cows wait for you and Babu
the wild dog. I know they made you do bad
things, but you are not a bad boy.
I am your father who loves you. And you will come home with me
and be my son again. And what follows is one of the
most touching moments in any movie I've ever seen.
Love breaks through dears amnesia.
He drops his gun and with wet cheeks he melts into his
father's arms. My friend, can you hear the
words? I am your father who loves you,
and you will come home with me and be my son and daughter
again.