There is a bluntness in the gospel. The utter absence of ambiguity characterizes
the truth. False religion is necessarily and typically
ambiguous, the gospel is not. It is blunt, straightforward. The gospel tells the truth with candor, plainly
spoken truth that is so straightforward and so unmistakable as to be blatantly offensive. In fact, the introductory line of the Christian
gospel goes like this: Every human being is a sinner. Every human being sins, because every human
being possesses a corrupt nature, a wicked disposition. Beyond just that corruption and wicked disposition,
all human beings are rebels against God. They have rebelled against God by the willful
and constant violation of His holy law, which is a reflection of His holy nature. Consequently, all sinners are under divine
judgment for their rebellion and their violation and their innate corruption. The sentence that comes from God on all mankind
is condemnation to eternal punishment in hell. That is the blunt and shocking and stunning
truth of the gospel. That's where it starts. There are people who are eager to remove that
part of the gospel, and therefore deconstruct the gospel and usually end up with a gospel
that is no gospel. And we learned earlier in Galatians, "If anybody
preaches another gospel let him be damned." We're all sinners, we're all under divine
judgment, and we can do nothing to change that on our own. Now that causes me to pose some questions
to get us into this text. Question number one: "How do we know that
we are all sinners? How do we know? What's the proof that we're all sinners?" Pretty popular to think of people as being
basically good. "What is the evidence that we are all sinners?" Very simple: Everyone dies. Everyone dies. The Old Testament says, "The soul that sins
it shall die." New Testament says, "The wages of sin is death." If you say you're not a sinner, then you have
to explain your death. If you say you're not corrupt, you have to
explain your demise. And further, if you say you have not sinned,
you lie, and you make God who says you are a sinner a liar, and that only compounds your
guilt. The message of the gospel initially is terrifyingly
clear and absolutely true. But hastily after that first affirmation there
is a second affirmation in the gospel, and it is this: God loves the world, and offers
them forgiveness and salvation. And that answers the second question: "Is
there anything that can be done about my condition?" The answer is yes. God loves the world. God provides deliverance from sin, from judgment,
from death, from hell to those who have faith in His Son the Lord Jesus Christ, the only
Savior of the world. There is eternal life in Him, forgiveness,
escape from hell, and entrance into the glories of God's own heaven. How do we know that that good news is true? The answer: the Bible gives us the proof of
it. The Bible, obviously, a book written by God,
authored by God, lays out the message of God's love and forgiveness through the sacrifice
of Jesus Christ. The proof of that second affirmation of the
Christian gospel is found throughout the pages of Scripture, Old Testament and New Testament. God has the desire to save because He loves
sinners, and God has sent a Savior who provided a sacrifice for sin that granted salvation
to those who believe. The Bible is the proof of that, and the Bible
stands on its own internal merit as inerrant and absolutely true. Now that leads to a next question, very important:
"How can I be sure that Christ is able to save anyone? How can I be sure that Christ is the Savior? If I'm going to turn to Him, put my faith
in Him, how can I be sure that Christ is able to save me?" Proof: He died and rose from the dead. He died a death that essentially was the wrath
of God on Him, not for any sins that He had done, for He had done none. But the Father imputed all the sins of all
the people who had ever believed through all of human history to Christ and punished Christ
all their sins. He died in the place of believers. His was the death for the sins of all who
believe. How do we know that His death satisfied God? Because God raised Him from the dead. God was satisfied, His wrath was propitiated,
and God raised Christ from the dead as a divine affirmation of the satisfaction of His own
sacrifice. Those are clear truths. Those are unambiguous truths. Those are the objective truths of the gospel. All men are sinners headed to eternal punishment. God loves and will forgive sinners who put
their faith in Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ is able to save. He has offered the sacrifice that satisfied
God, and therefore God declared that a satisfactory sacrifice by raising Him from the dead. You're a Christian because you believe that. All those, again, unambiguous truths are the
objective, historical realities about the gospel. All true Christians understand them, and embrace
them, and believe them; that's why they're Christians. But there's a fourth question, and this is
the one to which I want to draw your attention today. It is this question: "How can I be certain
that I have truly believed and received that salvation?" This is not the question, "Does Christ have
the power to save?" We believe that. We believe we're sinners. We believe God loves us and has provided a
way of salvation. We believe Christ has the power to save, as
demonstrated by His sacrifice and His resurrection. The question is a more personal question;
not an objective question, but a subjective question; not about something that happened
historically, but about our own hearts. "How can I be certain that I have believed
in Christ and been saved?" This is subjective, and this addresses the
difference between confidence, faith, and assurance that the Lord Jesus Christ has the
power to save; and confidence, assurance, and faith that I have actually been saved
by that power. Now let's be honest. Even though we believe those objective facts
of the gospel, as Christians, there are times when we struggle to be assured of our salvation. One of the things you deal with as a pastor
a lot is the problem with people who lack assurance of salvation. They don't doubt that they're sinful, they
don't doubt that God loves and provides a sacrifice in Christ, they don't doubt that
Christ has the power to save, they don't doubt the resurrection, but they doubt that they
are saved. What is it that steals a believer's assurance? Well, there are a number of things that will
weaken your assurance. One - and we'll give you a few: lack of impact,
lack of results in service. Some people look at their life and they say,
"You know, I'm a Christian supposedly. I have been transformed, and I have power
from on high. But I look at my life and I don't see any
impact. I try to do some things to serve the Lord;
I have to say I don't see much as a result of that." And someone in that kind of situation gets
discouraged and wonders whether they actually possess the power, whether they've actually
been given life. And then another reality that steals your
assurance is disobedience. You fail to obey the Word of God. You get caught up in transgressions, iniquities,
and sins. And because of your disobedience, which is
a willful disobedience, you naturally will question, "Am I genuinely a believer?" And I'm not talking about the occasional paraptōma
, when you stumble; but I'm talking about the fact that you're realizing that there's
something in you that continues to will to disobey. You see that and you wonder, "Have I really
been saved?" Another one is inconsistency. You go to the spiritual high occasionally. You're here today and your heart is lifted
up in worship. You'll find yourself a day later in a situation
that you shouldn't be in, and you looked at that situation and you see inconsistency in
your life, inconsistency in your attractions and your desires, and you wonder whether you're
really saved. And then there's the presence of sort of habitual,
indwelling sin. Here you are, you've been a believer for a
while and you're still struggling with the same exact sins that have been beleaguering
you for years and years, and you wonder, "If I'm really a believer, why can I not get victory
over these besetting sins?" And then you have to face the reality of temptation
to doubt. Satan tempts us to doubt. And doubt is a temptation. You doubt the truth of Scripture. You doubt the glory of God. You doubt the truth concerning Christ. You doubt a lot of things. That's a temptation. So, your assurance can be very weakened by
lack of results, lack of impact by your life, disobedience, inconsistency, the presence
of habitual, indwelling sin, temptation. Another one is sensitive conscience. There are some people who are more sensitive
than others. They tend to be wired to be more introspective
and more fearful, and they tend to be more doubtful in their own minds. And as they look at their lives and they begin
to become introspective, they see things they don't like there. Their conscience causes them pain and suffering
over their condition; and that begins to steal their assurance. There are other things. Neglect of worship: you come now and then,
and then you wonder why you're not certain of your salvation. You worship only on occasions with the people
of God; in negligence of fellowship, negligence of prayer, negligence of boldness in the proclamation
of the gospel. All these things are thieves that steal your
assurance. We're not saying they steal your salvation. Your salvation is fixed as a true believer. Your assurance may waver. But there's one other thing I want to talk
about. There's another reality that has a way of
stealing our assurance, and we'll just call it trouble, trouble, trouble with corollary
disappointment. Things aren't going the way you think they
ought to go. You find out about some illness, or the death
of a friend, or some tragedy with regard to a child, or you wonder why your relationship,
maybe even your marriage and your family is falling apart in horrific ways that are heartbreaking
to you. Some theologians have called this a frowning
providence. The providence of God seems always to be frowning
on you, and things never go the way you think they should go, and you begin to wonder whether
you are a child of God. And if you are a child of God, why doesn't
God pay more attention to you? And why does it seem that you're suffering
in an undue way? These are the kinds of things that weaken
and steal your assurance. And at some point, all Christians will have
gone through a time where they will say, "Am I really saved? Am I really saved?" Now our passage is going to give you an answer
that is marvelous to this question: "How can I be sure that Christ has truly saved me?" The answer here is very powerful. Let's begin at verse 1 of chapter 4. "Now I say, as long as the heir as a child,
he doesn't differ at all from a slave though he is owner of everything, but he is under
guardians and managers until the date set by the father. So also we, while we were children, were held
in bondage under the elemental things of the world. But when the fullness of the time came, God
sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, so that He might redeem those
who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons. Because you are sons, God has sent forth the
Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba! Father!' Therefore you are no longer a slave, but a
son; and if a son, then an heir through God." Now this is about sonship. This is about sonship. This is about the great doctrine of adoption,
adoption. Verse 5: "We have received the adoption as
sons." There are, as we saw last time, and looking
at the earlier verses, there are many aspects of the doctrine of salvation, regeneration,
conversion, justification. This is the doctrine of adoption, the doctrine
of adoption, one of the magnificent realities in the glorious complex of our salvation. We have been adopted into the family of God,
and are sons of God. Now how does this work? Go back to - or forward to Ephesians 1. And I just remind you of how Paul begins this
epistle in verse 3, blessing God. Listen to what he says: "Blessed be the God
and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in
the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the
world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons
through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the
praise of the glory of His grace, in which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved." He chose us, He predestined us to adoption
as sons. This is adoption. Adoption is a choice. Adoption takes place when someone makes a
child out of someone born into another family. Adoption is when you take a child born to
another family and bring that child into your family. That is exactly what God does with us. John 8, our Lord said, "You're of your father
the devil. You're of your father the devil. He is your father. You are children of disobedience; you are
children of wrath; you are children of Satan. That's your family. But God has chosen you, predestined you to
adoption as sons, according to the kind intention of His own will." This is part of realizing the richness of
salvation. We were a part of Satan's family; but God
has adopted us. This only happens in Christ, in Christ. We are adopted, Ephesians 1 says, in His Son. "We are blessed" - verse 3 - "with all spiritual
blessings in the heavenlies in Christ." Verse 4: "He chose us in Him." Verse 5: "Predestined to adoption as sons
through Jesus Christ to Himself," - verse 6 - "in the beloved," - verse 7 - "in Him,"
- and it goes on, verse 9 - "in Him," - verse 10 - "in Him," - verse 12 - "in Christ" - verse
13 - "in Him, in Him." God only has one Son, and it is the Lord Jesus
Christ. We are placed into Christ, and therefore we
become heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ, as we read in Romans 8. This is the great doctrine of adoption; and
we looked at it in some detail last time. "The Father loves the Son," John 3:35. And He loves those who are in the Son because
they are one with the Son. This is the marvelous reality of salvation. "Behold, what manner of love the Father has,
that He has made us" - 1 John 3:1 - "children of God." He loves us enough not only to do the negative,
save us from our sins, but do the positive: adopt us into His own family, into His one
eternal Son, to share His full inheritance. God's astounding love is the cause, the motive,
the drive behind our adoption. He loves the Son, He places us in the Son,
and He loves us the way He loves the Son. We see that laid out so magnificently in the
seventeenth chapter of John, where our Lord prays and binds those for whom He prays, all
believers together with Himself and with the Father, in this bond of love. We are loved by the Father because Christ
is loved. We are blessed by the Father because Christ
is blessed. We inherit all that Christ inherits because
we are in Christ. This is how we are to understand our adoption. We have been placed into His true Son, and
therefore are heirs of everything God possesses. This is adoption. God graciously places justified, regenerated,
sanctified believers into His own family by placing into union with His beloved Son, so
that in Him they become sons of God. Now that takes us back to this question again:
"How can I be certain that I have had that occur in my life? How can I be sure that have truly believed
in Christ so as to be saved? And how do I know that I am really in Christ
and have been adopted? How do I know that?" Confirmation of that comes in verse 6; this
is what I want you to see. The confirmation comes in verse 6. We saw the preparation for sonship, we saw
the realization for sonship, and here's the confirmation. This is a familiar verse, but one not understood. You're going to understand it this morning. "Because you are sons, God has sent forth
the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba! Father!'" "Because you are sons, God does this." That's exactly what it's saying. The fact is, you are sons, and because you
are, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our heart. That is the Holy Spirit. The Spirit of His Son is the same as the Spirit
of Christ, as He's called elsewhere. The Spirit of God, same thing, the Holy Spirit. God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into
our hearts because we are sons. Back again to Ephesians 1, and the end of
that long section, down to verse 13. "In Him, you also, after listening to the
message of the truth, the gospel of your salvation," - you listened, you heard - "you believed
also, you were sealed in Him" - that is Christ was your Savior permanently - "you were sealed
in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with
a view to the redemption of God's own possession, to the praise of His glory." When you were justified, when you were converted,
when you were saved, you were sealed with the Spirit of promise. The Spirit of promise took up residence in
your heart; that is what that verse is saying. The Spirit was given to you as a pledge of
our inheritance, which is coming later at the redemption of our bodies when we enter
into the presence of the Lord. So think of it this way. You have a future inheritance. You have an inheritance that the Lord has
prepared for you because you are a true believer. That inheritance is laid up for you in heaven. Listen to this from 1 Peter 1: "We have an
inheritance" - verse 4 - "which is imperishable, undefiled, will not fade away, reserved in
heaven for you." That's great; we have that. Jesus said, "I go to prepare a place for you,
and I'll come and take you to where I am, and you'll be with Me always." We have a place. We have a full inheritance that is imperishable,
undefiled, unfading, and reserved for only us in heaven. Then it says, "who are protected by the power
of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time." So now we have this future inheritance, and
we have a present protection, and that protection is the power of God; that is none other than
the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit in us is the protecting power
of God that secures us until we receive our inheritance. We are protected by the power of God, and
that power is the Holy Spirit. Peter says also, "You have become partakers
of the divine nature." That is to say, the very nature of God is
part of you. You are partaking in the nature of God. Again, that is a reference to the indwelling
Holy Spirit who provides for us this divine life and transformation. So if you are a true son of God, you possess
the Holy Spirit. In fact, it's so personal that verse 6 says,
"God sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts." That is clear in Scripture. First Corinthians 6, "Know you not that your
body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, which you have of God; you're not your own, but
bought with a price." "Your body is the temple of the Spirit of
God. Romans 8:9, I read it earlier: "If any man
does not have the Spirit of Christ, he's not of His." But you are His, and so you have the Holy
Spirit. Ezekiel 36. The great new covenant passage in Ezekiel
says that when we come to salvation, God puts a new spirit in us, His own Spirit. First Corinthians 12:13, "We are all made
to drink of one Spirit." Jesus said in John chapter 7 that when you
come to faith, and when you come to Him and come to salvation, something dramatic will
occur in your life, and it relates to the Holy Spirit. Listen to verses 38 and 39: "He who believes
in Me, as the Scripture said, 'From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.' But this He spoke of the Spirit, but this
He spoke of the Spirit, whom those who believed in Him were to receive." The Spirit is a flood of living waters in
us. Now this is part of our understanding of the
theology of the Holy Spirit, that He takes up residence in every believer's life. So this is the evidence that you are saved:
you possess the Holy Spirit. Now let me just make a brief aside here and
say this. Some of you are saying to yourselves, "You
keep talking about being adopted, adopted, adopted. But doesn't the Bible say we are born into
the family of God? Doesn't the Bible that we're born again?" Yes, it does. John 3, "You must be born of the water and
the spirit. You can't enter the kingdom of heaven unless
you're born again." First Peter 1:23 says that we're begotten
again. We're born again by the seed, which is the
word of God, the gospel seed which is the word of God. Yes, we are regenerated. We have been given new live. We are new creations. So it is true; we are born into the family
of God. So mark it. We are both born and adopted. Now that's not possible. That's not possible in the normal human world. But we're talking about two distinctly different
analogies or metaphors. Look, the Bible does this a lot. You can talk about the church as a kingdom,
you can talk about the church as a vineyard, you can talk about the church as a flock,
you can talk about the church as a body, you can talk about the church as a family. The Bible uses lots of different analogies
and metaphors to give us the full understanding of our identity in Christ. So we are both born into the family of God
by regeneration, and adopted into the family of God. Both are essential pictures to have us understand
the riches of salvation. Let me explain what I mean. Your birth into the family of God determines
your nature. It relates to your nature. You have died to the old man, you have died
to the old life; you are in Christ, a new creation. This relates to our nature. Our spiritual birth regeneration, being born
again relates to our nature. It is the work of transforming our nature,
regenerating us, giving us spiritual life. That is viewed as birth. On the other hand, adoption does not relate
to the receiving of eternal life, but relates to the inheritance that is ours. It relates to what God will grant us out of
the love that He has for us. So when we talk about new birth, we're talking
with reference to our nature; we've been recreated. When we're talking about adoption we're talking
about inheritance; that's what we're going to receive. The Lord has chosen to give us the inheritance. The reason that might be important to know
is that there are plenty of sons who have been disinherited. Father will never do that. We're both born into the family and will receive
the full inheritance of an adopted son. Adoption connects with election. Adoption connects with predestination in Ephesians
chapter 1, "Chosen in Him before the foundation of the world, predestined to adoption as sons." Out of all the world, God looked into the
kingdom of Satan, saw the children of the devil, and chose you. So in one metaphor, you are born into the
family of God, which then is the metaphor that expresses the fact that you possess a
new nature, the nature of that is divine, received from God. You already have eternal life in you now. Adoption speaks of your inheritance. So how do we know, how do we know that we
have the Holy Spirit? Right? How do we know that we have the Holy Spirit? That's the next question. It's fine to say that. But how do I know that I have the Spirit of
His Son in me? I get it. Romans 8:11, "His Spirit dwells in you." Romans 8:14, "All who are led by the Spirit
of God, these are the sons of God." First John 3:24, "We know by this that He
abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us." Or Romans 5:5, "The love of God had been poured
out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us." So we are told the Holy Spirit is given to
us. He is in us, in our hearts inside of us. How do we know that? How do we know that? Jesus said in John 14 to the disciples, "The
Spirit has been with you; He will be in you." How do I know the Spirit is in me? How do I know that Ephesians 3:16 is my experience? "According to the riches of His glory. You are strengthened in the inner man by the
power of the Holy Spirit." How do I know that? Well, there are a number of ministries the
Holy Spirit conducts. He teaches us. First Corinthians chapter 2 says this about
the Holy Spirit's ministry. "We have received, not the spirit of the world,
but the Spirit who's from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by
God." The Holy Spirit shows us all the blessings
that God has given us. First John 2:27, "The Holy Spirit is the anointing
that teaches us all things." So we don't need human teachers. So we've all experienced the instructing work
of the Holy Spirit. That's why you're in this church, by the way,
if you're here regularly. That's why you're not sitting in a dark room
with strobe lights and rock and roll music, because you're far more interested in having
your heart ignited by the instructing of the Spirit of God through the Word of God than
you are in an emotional experience. That's why you're here. In fact, that's alien to you. That's not interesting to you. You don't care about that; you don't want
that. You have tasted of the instructing of the
Holy Spirit. You have had a Luke 24 experience: "Did not
our heart burn within us while He spoke with us from the Word." Your hearts have burned under the glory of
the Word of God, His own inherent glory. So you have had the ministry of the Holy Spirit
in instructing you. Secondly, the Holy Spirit leads us. You've been led by the Holy Spirit. You don't know it when it's happening, you
can't feel anything, but you certainly know it in retrospect, don't you. You look back and you see providence, after
providence, after providence, after providence of the Lord directing every single step all
the way; and you look back and say, "I had been led. There is no explanation for this except from
the Holy Spirit." You have also experienced the comfort from
the sovereign companion. John 14, Jesus said, "I'm going to send the
Comforter. I'm going to send the Helper, the Paraclete
[???], the one who comes alongside and helps you." You've gone through the trials of life, the
difficulties of life, and you have found peace and comfort. It's a peace that passes understanding, and
people don't know how you can be so calm and so joyful in the middle of all that's going
on. You've experienced the comforting work of
the Holy Spirit in your heart. You've been filled with the Holy Spirit. Ephesians 5 says that we are filled with the
Holy Spirit. What does that mean? When you're filled with the Holy Spirit you
speak to yourself in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs; you sing, make melody in
your heart to the Lord. You come to worship and your heart is lifted
up, and you love the music; and that is the work of the Spirit in you. But there's another thing here, a specific,
very specific thing that Paul is going to say to you. Yes, we've experienced His instruction, His
leading, His comfort, and His feeling. We've even experienced His conviction. Convicts the world of sin and righteousness
and judgment. But Paul wants you to look at this, and I
doubt whether you've really thought this one through. How do you know when you're saved? Because you have the Spirit of God in your
heart. How do you know He's in your heart? "Because He's in your heart crying, 'Abba! Father!'" That's not some generic idea, that is a very
specific statement: "Abba! Father!" The Holy Spirit in you is crying. The verb here means a loud, urgent cry from
someone in profound suffering, someone in fear, someone terrified, someone in pain,
someone in loss, someone who is deeply needy; that's the word. And what the Word of God is telling us here
is that, "You know you're saved when you get to the point of suffering, and your instant
response is to cry out, "Abba," which means that you are saying, "Papa." That's the Aramaic diminutive. You're saying, "Daddy." This is the evidence that you are a true son
of God; you rush to your Father's arms. You know He loves you, you know He's your
Father, you know He has all the resources. Unbelievers don't do that. An unbeliever might say, "Oh, God," but not,
"Abba." An unbeliever might get mad at whatever god
he thinks exists. But in the deepest and darkest experiences
of believers, they cry out to God. This is all of our lives, isn't it? This is what we do. This is what we do. And here when you do that, notice in verse
6, it is the Spirit of His Son crying, "Abba, Father," in you." He has linked with your faith, and He's crying
in you. The Holy Spirit literally in you sends you
rushing into the presence of God. This is how we live our lives. I think back; there's some dramatic things
in my life. My son Mark was told - I was told he had a
brain tumor, it could be fatal. I didn't question God. I didn't get angry with God, I just ran to
God. I just ran to Him in my heart and in my prayers,
prayer and fasting for days and days. When Patricia had a car accident and broke
her neck C2-C3, my precious wife, there was no anger, I just ran to God. And that's the Spirit in me, sending me to
my Father. That's not what nonbelievers do, that's what
believers do. So the reality is, in the darkest of your
hours, the reality of your salvation will have its most powerful proof. I want to show you something further. Look at Romans 8:15, which I read a little
bit ago, and we'll wrap up our thoughts. Romans 8:15. "For you have not received a spirit of slavery
leading us to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry,
'Abba! Father!'" Wait a minute. Who's crying, "Abba, Father," in Galatians? The Holy Spirit. Who's crying, Abba, Father," here? We are. The Holy Spirit is crying, "Abba, Father,"
in Galatians; we're crying, "Abba, Father," here, which is to say that the Holy Spirit
is operating through our faith. When some people want to explain the Holy
Spirit crying, they want to make it something outside of us. It's something inside of us. It is distinct; it's the Holy Spirit crying,
"Abba, Father," Galatians. It's us crying, "Abba, Father," Romans. It's a distinction, but it's indistinguishable. "It is" - according to Romans 8:16 - "the
Spirit Himself testifying with our Spirit." There it is. It's the Spirit connected to our redeemed
Spirit, and together the Spirit is empowering us to cry out to God. That's where that boldness to go to the throne
of grace comes from. There is not, in the life of a nonbeliever,
any kind of filial attraction to God. There is not that fatherly draw. There is not that open-hearted, rushing into
the arms of one you know loves you. It is both our faith and the Spirit's testimony
together. It is both something apart from us, the cry
of the Holy Spirit; and something within us, our own heart's cry. Again, it is a distinction without being distinguishable. You say, "It's hard to understand that." I don't think so, and I'll show you why. Romans 10 says this in verse 9. Let's take the first part. "If you confess Jesus as Lord, you will be
saved." Obviously includes believing God raised Him
from the dead. "If you confess Jesus as Lord, you'll be saved." And you're to do that. I call on you: confess Jesus as Lord, and
be saved. If you confess Jesus as Lord, you will be
saved. But listen to this. Listen to 1 Corinthians 12:3. "No one, no one can say, 'Jesus is Lord,'
except by the Holy Spirit." So it's you saying, "Jesus is Lord," in Romans
10; it's the Holy Spirit saying, "Jesus is Lord," in 1 Corinthians 12. It is the Holy Spirit empowering our faith. It's like all other acts of faith, all other
acts of faith. Reading the Word is an act of faith, empowered
by the Holy Spirit. Worshiping is an act of faith, empowered by
the Holy Spirit. Praying is an act of faith, empowered by the
Holy Spirit. Crying out in need, crying from the depths
of our broken hearts to God in sorrow. It's not something we do alone, it's a partnership
with the Holy Spirit, it's an inexplicable one. But it's the same as all other connection. I don't live my Christian life, the Holy Spirit
lives it in and through me, and yet it's not apart from me. It is a distinction without being distinguishable. First Peter 1 calls this being distressed,
"the proof of your faith being more precious than gold." You want to know whether your faith's real? In your darkest hour, when you run to a loving
Father and pour out your heart, you are crying, "Abba! Father!" That's the evidence that the Spirit is in
you. Only truly saved believers do that. Final illustration. Turn to Mark 14 and verse 36. They're in Gethsemane. Verse 33 says, "Jesus began to be distressed
and troubled. He said to them, 'My soul is deeply grieved
to the point of death; remain here and watch.'" This is the darkest hour in the entire life
of Christ up to this point. This is the deepest, darkest hour in His life. "He went a little beyond," - verse 35 - "fell
to the ground, began to pray." In the deepest, darkest moment of His life,
anticipating the bearing of the sins of all who would ever believe through human history,
experiencing the fury and the wrath of God, the fury and wrath that all hell could never
eliminate. But He would have to absorb in three hours
of darkness. In anticipation of the horrors of that, sweating,
as it were, great drops of blood; in the hour of His deepest agony, what does He say in
verse 36? He was saying over and over, "Abba! Father! Abba! Father!" This is the only time recorded in the New
Testament that Jesus ever said, "Abba," to His Father. And it's because it's connected to the deepest,
darkest sorrows of life. And even Jesus in that horrendous situation
ran to His Father. You are a son, because the Spirit is in you. You know the Spirit is in you: yes, because
He leads you; yes, because He teaches you; yes, because He comforts you; yes, because
He convicts you. But specifically, you know He's in you, because
in your stress and disappointment and sorrow and pain, you run to the Father, and you say,
"Papa! Daddy!" You say it without fear. You say it with love. You say it out of the desperation of your
need. All fear is removed, and you run into the
arms of your true Father. Lord God, we are blessed beyond comprehension
at so many levels and so many ways. But we seem to be unable to exhaust all the
ways that You demonstrate your love to us. Every time we turn around some new reality
of Scripture jumps out at us and sets our hearts on fire. We understand the fellowship of the burning
heart, because our hearts burn within us when You speak with us through Your Word. We thank You for the unambiguous and blunt
gospel. We thank You because it's clear to us. We're sinful; we need a Savior; there is a
Savior. He has the power to save. And we can even know that He has saved us,
because we cry, "Papa! Daddy! Abba!" Just to think that we, unworthy sinners, would
rush into the Holy of Holies because You are our loving Father. And the Holy Spirit has granted us by His
presence in us that rich assurance and confidence. There are no words for us to express our gratitude. May we rejoice in our true salvation. We give You all the praise. Amen.
