Heavenly Father, we thank you for where you have placed us on this earth, full of beauty and harvests and the seasons. We thank you for the gifts of food and drink, of home and marriage and children. And above all, Lord, we thank you for our Savior, Jesus Christ. that we can enjoy these things with great hope that though we pass away, we will live with you forever. We thank you that you watch over all and that your eyes on your people and that you preserve us. And so Lord, we ask that you would preserve us in the faith. Lord, forgive us for our sins. and help us to see them and turn from them. Lord, give us clear sight so we can see not just our sins, but what their end is. Give us clear sight so we can see our Savior and see the blessings that come from following him. Lord, we pray for our nation, that you would forgive our nation's sins. and that you would turn us as a nation to acknowledge and to be humble before you. Let me pray for the churches, Lord. We thank you that you have spread your church around all the world. And we pray that you'd help us all to praise you today with integrity of heart, with humility before you, hearkening to your word, not to the sounds of the world. And we pray that you'll be glorified here now. We would worship you with understanding and with joy. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen. Please be seated. We start in the Bible to Exodus at chapter 20. Exodus at chapter 20, which you can find on page 61 there in the pew Bible. We have here the 10 commandments. We're going to read them together in unison. So Exodus chapter 20, reading the 10 commandments together in unison, that's from verse 1 to verse 17. So let us read. And God spoke all these words, saying, I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image. or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him in guiltless who takes his name in vain. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male servant or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife. or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's. Let's consider verse 15 right now, the eighth commandment, you shall not steal. Alright, what shall you do? Each commandment implies a positive duty when it forbids something. If you're not to steal, well then you are to work. made it explicit Ephesians 4, let the thief steal no longer but rather let him labor working with his own hands what is good so that he can share with the one who is in need notice how repentance is charted out there it's not just that you stop doing the bad thing but that you start doing the opposite rather than taking from people what belongs to them you should be ready to give so he says you shall labor working not just to provide for yourself first, but then also able to help out the one in need. That means that you shall contribute. Children, do you have any chores in your family? Any chores around the house? You know, there's a couple attitudes that can be brought to the chores. One is to say, I won't do it until my parents make me. This makes for an unhappy house. Another attitude is to say, I will do the minimum necessary to get the parents off my back. And the third way is to say, I live here, this is my house, and it's nice when the house is clean. Let me do it in a way that shows that I know how to work, that I know how to clean, that I'm not a resentful person, but no, I'm a child of this family. This is my house, and I'm going to help to make it clean. You shall contribute. It's the basic idea here. You shall not steal, not lessen, take away, but rather work and contribute and build things up. And you shall preserve. It's the summer. That means in some places in this country, it's riot season. And some people who, for some reason, want to defend riots will say, well, it's just property. Well, look at the commandment. You shall not steal. And when you break what belongs to someone else, when you ruin it, torture it, vandalize it or burn it, you're stealing that from them. They don't have the full unencumbered use of their shop anymore or their car anymore. No, you have stolen that from them. And just because it didn't go into your pocket because you broke it, frankly, I think that makes it worse. You took it, at least you could make some use out of it. So, to vandalize, to burn, to destroy, all these things also. You're depriving the owner of the right use of what was his, you're stealing. So there's a positive side to all these things. We're to be good stewards of what is ours. Good stewards of what belongs to the family. And we're to help others to be good stewards of what is theirs. Because God in his providence has allowed it to this one this and to that one that. We're not to overturn that providence. We're to encourage and rejoice in it. And help our neighbor enjoy his stuff. even as we seek to be good stewards of our own. Romans chapter 8 verse 12. You can find the page 944. Read from verse 12 to verse 23. Our theme today is adoption. I want you to particularly look for that theme in what we read now and what we'll read later. But adoption has a lot of things that go with it, as we'll be saying. So notice also that. It's not just the word adoption, but what goes along with that. So, Romans chapter 8, reading from 12 to 23, please give your attention to the Word of God. So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh, you will die. But if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the spirit of adoption as sons by whom we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. And if children, then heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ. provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with the eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. We'll stop our reading at that point. Let's pray. Ask God to open our ears. Heavenly Father, we thank you. We thank you that you have spoken. We thank you that you have preserved your word and given it to us in the Bible. We thank you that you speak in many different ways. That you give us songs, that you give us histories, that you give us letters. And so Lord, we pray that you'd help us. to take in what you have for us today. We pray that you would be attentive to it and understand. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen. Now please turn to Ephesians at chapter 1. Give me a second to suck on this cough drop. I got water. I need something stronger. Ephesians chapter 1, I'm going to read from verse 1 to 18. Our theme is adoption, but also what goes with being adopted. So Ephesians chapter 1, going from 1 to 18, please give your attention again to the Word of God. Ephesians chapter 1, reading from 1 to 18. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God, to the Saints who are in Ephesus and are faithful in Christ Jesus. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love He predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of His will, to the praise of His glorious grace, with which He has blessed us in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace, which He lavished upon us, and all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of His will, according to His purpose, which He set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time. to unite all things in Him, things in heaven and things on earth. In Him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him, who works all things according to the counsel of His will, so that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be to the praise of His glory. In Him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of His glory. For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love towards all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know What is the hope to which He has called you? What are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints? When last I spoke to you, our topic was justification. That God looks at the believer in Christ and says, just. That is, acquitted, righteous. This is a great thing for us to know. The God, the Judge, has already looked at the believer in Christ and said, because you have believed in Christ, His sacrifice is credited to you. He has atoned for your sin. You are forgiven. So I was able to say on Friday night, Shawn Hong, your sins are forgiven because you believed in Jesus. People say, Wang Ting, your sins are forgiven because you have believed in Jesus. I can say that not because I'm doing anything, but because I'm telling you what the Word of God proclaims. That God justifies the one who believes in Jesus. Never forget it. This is key and precious. But now we've got to ask a further question. If I am driving, say to a wedding, and say, oh, maybe I have an accident, and say I'm mad at the other person, and then suppose I say, you know what? I'm going to forgive the other person. I'm not going to hold it against them. All right? What is my continuing responsibility or relationship to that other person? Probably nothing. We go our separate ways. Or if for some reason I am dragged into court and I lay out my case and the judge says, you can go now, you're acquitted. What is my further relationship to the judge? Hopefully nothing, because I want to get out of there. So if God is the judge and he has looked at the believer in Christ and said, acquitted, OK, good. That means we're safe for eternity. That is great. Does it make any difference now? Is there any continuing relationship to God the judge in the here and now? And hopefully you say, oh, I know there has to be, because before we did justification, you did union with Christ. And if we now have a union with Christ, then obviously you have to say that there is a continuing relationship there. If he is the vine and we are the branches, that wasn't, I mean, the whole point of that was stay in the vine. What is it? What does this continuing relationship look like? What we're going to talk about today is the next aspect of that or perhaps a simultaneous aspect of that. We're going to talk about adoption. Let me talk to Audrey for a second. Audrey, do you know what adoption is? You do. Excellent. How about Cleo? Does she know? Yeah? I'm less than convinced. All right, I'm going to tell you anyway. Adoption, Cleo, is when there's a child and for some reason the parents are no longer around. Maybe they died in a car crash. Who knows? Maybe they're in prison. But there's a child and there's no longer father or mother. Very sad. But then some other adults come along. Some other adults come along and say, you need a family. You can be part of our family. We're going to take you home and you will be our daughter now. Because you don't have your own. That's adoption. Adoption is when you take that child who's alone and you take the child and the child becomes part of a family. They have adopted the child. The whole thing was called adoption. And it's a wonderful act of love. What we see here in this passage is that God decided in advance that he would adopt some people. Now that gets us in the deep water really quick. When we say God decided in advance to adopt some people. You might say, well wait a minute. Isn't God father of all? Why does anybody need to be adopted? We have to say, well, yes, God is creator of all. So in that sense, you could say he's the ultimate father of all, being the creator. But think a little more about creation. He creates Adam and Eve, and they sin, and he drives them out. He guards the door. I guess they're not in the family anymore. And we're Adam and Eve's descendants by nature. So no, by nature, we are estranged from God. We're not in the family. There's an ultimate sense in which he's the father, but we're not on good terms with this father. We are outside the house, outside the family. That's why we need to be adopted. We don't come into the world at peace with God. We come into the world at a distance. Now, why does He decide it in advance? Well, look at verse 5. He predestined us. He made it our destiny ahead of time. He predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ. Verse 4 is even more explicit. He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world. Oh, that's way in advance. That's even before your grandparents were born. Before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before Him. In other words, he has had a plan, and it has always been the plan. For example, that he would draw you here into this congregation today. Isn't that an awesome thing to think about? To you, it can seem like the most random thing in the world. Or perhaps, it wasn't random, I chose that. To some extent, I suppose you did, as far as you go. But farther than you can go, is God Almighty, who has had a plan from before the foundation of the world. and that he would predestine some for adoption. But why am I saying some? Well, look at verse 5 again. He predestined us For adoption, well, who's the us? You say, well, it's Paul to the saints in Ephesus. And Paul doesn't mean the best two Christians in Ephesus. It means all the Christians, everybody in that church in Ephesus. And by extension, since it's scripture, it's not just Paul and the Ephesians. It's Christians generally. That's the us, everybody who believes in Jesus. Verse 13, when you heard the word of truth and believed in him, that's who he's talking to. He's speaking to Christians in general, but Christians are not everybody. And so that is why he says he predestined some, that he would adopt some. And just as adoptive parents decide who they're going to adopt. Kids in the orphanage can try to be cute, but it's up to the parents who are walking in to say, all right, we're adopting this one, or maybe the people who run the orphanage. But anyway, it's some adult makes the decision about the adoption, all right? The kids don't get to, I'm choosing to be adopted by you. That's not how it works. So it is that God has made the decision of whom to adopt. There's some issues here that we'll talk about in subsequent weeks, like predestination. But for right now, let me just focus on this. God has decided beforehand to adopt some. How should we respond to that? Well, what's the tone of the passage? I'd say it's rather exuberant. As a matter of fact, it's one sentence from verse 3 to verse 14. you're allowed to do that in Greek. Alright? You're like, I see periods in there. Yeah, to make it decent English. Alright? But the Greek is one long sentence. He just keeps on going about all the things that we have because we are in Christ. It's exuberant and joyful and thankful and he's praising God and that is how we should respond to this truth that God decided beforehand that he would adopt some. We should especially praise if we're Gentiles, which as far as I know is pretty much everybody here today that is not Jewish. Because God had already adopted Israel. Exodus 4, Israel is my firstborn son, says the Lord. He'd already adopted Israel. That's why it says in Romans 9, to the Jews belong the adoption and the law and the covenants. But if we keep reading in Ephesians, chapter 2 says yes, but he's broken down the dividing wall that separated Jew and Gentile. And now Gentiles also are being adopted when we believe in Jesus Christ. So here's what this means. When you believed in Jesus and the judge looked on you, God the judge, and said, just. He didn't send you out the back door of the courtroom. He brought you through his end of the courtroom because he took you home to make you his child. That's the Christian picture. Forgiven and brought home to be a loved child. That is the glory of adoption. These are the twin instantaneous benefits of believing in Jesus. You are forgiven, you are adopted. Speaking about justification, forgiveness and adoption. And it's an act. God does it. It's His gracious act. And He does it in a moment. It's an act. He does it, and it's accomplished, and it is in effect. And if you have not believed in Jesus Christ, my prayer for you is that you will, so that you can be my brother or sister, and I can have fellowship with you forever. And if you have believed in Jesus Christ, then today I want you to lay hold of this truth of our adoption. of our, therefore, fraternal relations, our brotherhood in Christ. I want you to lay hold of that. Because when you believe in Jesus, God adopts you. Now someone will say, wait a minute, wait a minute, he said it was a predestined thing, he had a plan, so that means that there's nothing I can do about it. Wrong deduction. What's it say in verse 13? In Him, when you heard and believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit. You're not called on to discern what God's eternal plan is. You're called to believe in the King of Kings. That's your part. And when you hear the call to believe in the King of Kings, you believe. And then you're humble about it. Because you recognize that underneath all of our willing and doing and responding, God was acting and working out His plan. So we're called to be loyal to King Jesus. He's the best king ever. Because he has died for his people. And he forgives them. And he not only forgives them, he brings them in. Not just to the country, but into his house. Not to be a slave, but to be a child. This is our King, the Lord Jesus Christ. So now I want to ask this. What do God's adopted children get? It's going to be similar to what adopted kids get, or you wouldn't use this imagery, you wouldn't use the language of adoption. Clearly it has to be similar, but he's God, so it's not going to be exactly the same. What do God's adopted children get? And that's what I want to drive into your brain now. This is the rest of the sermon. What do we get as God's adopted children? Number one, we get a father. God's adopted children get the Heavenly Father. You know, in Islam, there's 99 or 101 or something names for God. None of them is Father. In the Old Testament, the language of God as Father is in there, but not very prominent. And Jesus comes and he says, pray this way, our Father. That is because Jesus is the elder brother. who acts as the agent of our adoption. Because He is the One who adopts us, He is the One who then teaches us, alright, now in me you can call God Father. And of course He's teaching us to pray. Since God is our Father, we have access to Him. You don't have much access to the President, or much access to the Judge, but you have access to your Father. You can pray to Him, which means that when you are low, when you are upset, when you don't know why, you're not to raise a fist to the sky, that's the unbeliever's stance. You're to raise a hand to the sky, open it up and pray to Him. Pray, Father. That's the point of the Abba Father that we read. Pray to God. You have access to Him in Christ. So we have a Father. That means we have access to the Father. That also means we have a protector. We can sing the Psalms confidently. God is my rock and my refuge, my stronghold and my fort and my deliverer. And those words are for us when we are in Christ. It's not for someone else, that is for us to sing and to hold on to. And we're to read the scripture and see how God delivered Esther, and Daniel, and Daniel's three friends, and David, and Abraham, and Sarah, and say, yes, God is a protector. And he is my protector, because in Christ, I am his child as well. We get a father, which means access. It means protection. It means provision. Jesus says don't be anxious not you got to work, but don't be anxious about what you will eat or drink or wear The world's worried about that you're not to be worried. Why not your heavenly father knows that you need them You may not need the fancy dress, but he knows you need something to put on and he will provide for you You may not need the smoked salmon, but you need a sandwich and God will provide that for you He is a provider. That's why we sang in Psalm 37, I used to be young, now I'm old, but I've never seen the just forsaken, their children begging bread. Well, why not? Because God has provided for those children. So when we're adopted, we get a father. We can pray to God. We have access to him in the name of Christ. We have a protection. We pray to him and he hears us. We have a provider. And here's the one you might not appreciate, but you should. We get discipline. This is made in Proverbs 3 and picked up and quoted in Hebrews 12. God disciplines those whom he loves. Jesus made the same point when he talked about the branches that do bear fruit, he prunes that they may bear more fruit. Same point. God disciplines those that he loves. Because like children, we do stupid stuff. And like children, we do sinful stuff. And that is dangerous to ourselves and to others. And so a good father doesn't let that go on. For our own good and others' good, he disciplines us. As it says in Hebrews, if he's not doing that, that's a bad sign. You must not be a real child. You must be an illegitimate child if you have no discipline from the father. So all those who believed in Jesus are adopted. God a plant. That means we get a father and that means we get what fathers give. We have access to the father, protection from the father, provision from the father, discipline from the father. Now we read Romans 8 and Ephesians 1. If we'd read a third passage it would have been Galatians 4. What Galatians 4 stresses for us is that we get freedom. When God adopts believers, He redeems them and sets them free. We have that here, first of all, in verse 7. We have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses. He sets us free from our sins. They are no longer hanging over us and they are no longer more powerful than us. We can break free of them with the help of God. Galatians 4 goes on to say, And if the believer is Jewish, he's freed from the ceremonial law. He doesn't have to keep kosher anymore. He doesn't have to make the sacrifices anymore. He doesn't have to be circumcised anymore. All of those things were a tutor to lead him on to Jesus Christ. When Christ comes, the tutor fades away. And if the Jews are set free from that, how much more are Gentiles? We don't have to do that. And if we're Gentiles, it says in Galatians 4, then we're set free from pagan deities. No longer deceived and fascinated by demons. You might say, I don't know what you're talking about. Well, talk to some of our friends from a different religious background and you might learn some things. We're set free from being fascinated and under the control and bewitchment of demons. That's why there's so much in the Gospels about Jesus casting out demons. It's not a sideshow. It's a pretty central point in the Gospels that Jesus is much stronger and he frees people, apparently by the dozens, from the evil spirits that have a grip on them. The devil's a cruel master. He promises you bliss, he gives you slavery, and God sets us free from him. So Galatians 5 goes on to say, for freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm therefore and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. And we're free because we're children. Children get the run of the house and children get to expect that they will always be in the house. Servants and slaves do not have any assurance that they will always be welcome in the house. Time may come when their employment is up and they're out, but the children, they belong there. They are free. So you're to enjoy your freedom. Adopted by a father who's a good and loving heavenly father, he gives freedom, and he gives the Holy Spirit as well. Notice verse 13. In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it. When God adopts believers, that is, He seals us with the Holy Spirit. Now, I spent most of my 52 years trying to get my head around the word seal. I knew it wasn't the marine animal, all right, but I wasn't quite sure what the point was. The seal, you can put it on like a piece of paper, you stick it in the seal. It doesn't just put a mark on it, it like pops it up and makes it a 3D thing. So that piece of paper with the seal on it, You can't put that in a copier and get the seal back. What comes out of a copier is flat. When you put the seal in, it's bumpy. So that's a mark of authenticity. This diploma really was issued by Harvard. Somebody typed it in and made a nice seal and popped it in the copier. No. It has the Harvard seal on it. It's authentic. So a seal can show ownership. It can show that something is legitimate. It could also serve as a signature for people who could write. Somebody's important but he can't write. Well, if he has a seal, alright, that's the king's seal on this document. I better do whatever is inside of this document. It really is sealed by the king. So God seals us with the Holy Spirit. You say, I'd rather have something I can see. Well, that's what baptism is for. Baptism is the visual way of saying this one is sealed. But God can see whom He has sealed. God can see who He has placed the Holy Spirit on. The Holy Spirit is God. God knows who has the Holy Spirit. That means that God knows that we're His. He's marked us in a way He sees. And that's what baptism testifies to us. That we have the Holy Spirit. And how the Holy Spirit means so much, we'll have to do a separate sermon on that. But we'll just mention that right now. The Holy Spirit enables us to pray. It's in Romans 8. Those who have the spirit of his son, they cry, Abba, Father, which means the church is multinational. That's the message of Abba, Father. In the Greek, you're going along, you're reading Greek words, and you hit Abba. Abba is not a Greek word. Abba is an Aramaic word. It means father, as in Abraham, father of many. So the Ab thing is father. So Abba is my father. And then, after writing the Aramaic word, then he writes the Greek word, Father. And so to preserve the effect for us in English, they keep the Aramaic word, Abba, and then instead of giving you the Greek, they give you the English, Father. All right, we have a multinational church crying out, both Jews and Gentiles, okay, Hebrews and Greeks, crying out to God the Father together. And the Holy Spirit helps us to pray to God as Father. Holy Spirit helps us to cry out when we don't know what to say. Holy Spirit helps us with groanings too deep for words. When God adopts believers, He gives us the Holy Spirit. So when you're adopted by God, what do you get out of it? You get a father, you get the Holy Spirit, you get freedom, and you get family. When God adopts, He gives us as brothers and sisters to each other. You can imagine, perhaps, a child in an orphanage. Maybe big room, everybody on a bed. And the parents, the prospective adoptive parents come in. And every eye is on these parents. Who are they coming for? I hope it's me. And they come up to a certain bed. And they say, we're going to adopt you. And you say, hooray! I have a daddy! I have a mommy! Hey, first question. Do I have any brothers and sisters? because you don't know who's adopted you, right? Do they have other kids? You might be adopted by a childless couple, right? That might be why they're adopting. Maybe they don't have any, but other people, they might have six kids and yet they adopt number seven. But your first question, okay, I see daddy, I see mommy, where are you from? And do I have brothers and sisters? Well, here in the church, when you come to Christ, you get millions. And if that seems like too much, we'll just keep it on the local church and say you have dozens. You have dozens of brothers and sisters. Because when the Father adopts you, you're not the first and only one He's adopted. He's adopted millions, many, and He makes you their brothers and sisters, which means that now we have fraternal relations. We have duties to each other. You come into space already inhabited by others. Okay, how do we do things here? Whereas before we just did whatever we felt like, now let us communicate and coordinate and see how the other people are doing. Let's be accountable to each other, because that's what makes family family, not a collection of strangers in a house. And we get an elder brother. Native-born Americans, have you noticed this? You speak to our friends from Malaysia or Cameroon or perhaps, I'm not quite sure about Pakistan, but definitely Ghana. And you ask about the family, and they don't say simply, my brother or my sister. Have you noticed that? It is almost always my older brother or my younger brother, my older sister or my younger sister. And you say, well, that's funny. Can't you just say brother? No, because in some cases, they're translating different words into English. It might be, in some cases, one word for an older brother and a different word for a younger brother. Because the relationship is different. There's different duties and responsibilities based on many cultures, whether the sibling is older than you or younger than you. You can ask our friends about that later. I already have. I've noticed this. I'm like, what are you talking about, Roland? What are you talking about, Xuan Hong? Why is it always elder sister? or in some cases, elder sister number four or number five. What is this? Well, it matters in many cultures. And those are cultures from far apart, by the way. And the point is that there are responsibilities of protection and maybe of listening, going up and down and so on. And when I bring it back to this, Jesus Christ is our elder brother. It's Romans 8. We're given to Jesus by the Father that Jesus might be the firstborn among many brothers. That's Romans 8, 29. Now, he is the only natural child, the only Son of God, capital S. And the reason why I keep saying adopted as sons, though, and you're like, well, I'm a girl. Okay, the reason that it translates it that way is to keep the tie between the Son and us. Our childhood of God is connected to the Son. So to bring that through, you say the Sonship, okay? Doesn't matter if you're a boy or a girl, you're adopted by God and through the Son. We are sons because of that Son. And He's the only natural child. He's the one who's our agent of our adoption. He's the one who redeemed us. He sets the example for us. He tells us the rule of the house. He's the elder brother who protects us, as the Father does, but He's closer to us. Because He has taken on our flesh and our own human nature. So when God adopts you, you get many brothers and sisters. And in particular, you get Jesus Christ, the elder brother. And again, I'm stressing, and that's a different animal than just a brother. And you get an inheritance. When God adopts believers, they become His heirs. And we inherit from Him. I had a professor in seminary who's his great, what he had written on for his thesis was adoption. And so we really focused on the five places in the Bible where you see the word adoption. And there's plenty to talk about in those five prominent important places. But it seemed to me this week that he was kind of making his focus a little too narrow because there's a lot in the Bible, a lot more than five about heirs and inherits and inheritance. And that goes with the idea of being a child, which you become by adoption. Once you're adopted, now all the things about heirs and inheriting, that's for you. And you're to look at that. And so that's why we read on to verse 18. Because in verse 11, you get it. In Him we have obtained an inheritance. In verse 14, He's the guarantee, the Holy Spirit is the guarantee of our inheritance. Verse 18, I want you to know the riches of His glorious inheritance. Elsewhere, he said, the meek shall inherit the earth. Those who leave father and mother, brother and sister for the gospel's sake will get brothers and sisters and fathers and mothers and inherit eternal life. Jesus will say to those on his right, come, blessed are my father, inherit the kingdom that was prepared for you from the foundation of the world. It says in Hebrews that angels help those who will inherit eternal life. Through faith and patience we will inherit the promises. Our inheritance is described in these different terms as being the earth, or being the kingdom of heaven, or being eternal life, all words pointing at the same thing, of always being secure in God's hands. And in Romans 8.23 we have this also, that our inheritance will also include a redeemed, resurrected body. It's the last step of our adoption when He raises us in glory with a glorified body. So what do you get when God adopts you? You get a father. A father who provides and protects, who you can talk to, and who disciplines you. You get freedom. You get a family. You get the Holy Spirit. You get an inheritance. I hope you see this mirrors being an adopted kid, but it's better. And you get a new way of life. God adopts believers. He gives us a new way to live. This should be obvious from everything that I've said. If you suddenly have a father, your life has changed. Now there is responsibilities and protection and many things. Life is different. If you're freed from sins and from other religions, well, your life is changed. Things should be different. If you're given the Holy Spirit, well, the word holy is right in there. There's a different way to live, a way of increasing holiness. If you have dozens of brothers and sisters, well, your life just changed. There's a different way to live. Obviously, you have a new way to live when you are adopted by God, but some Christians want to stay in that mindset that I got off and I'm leaving the courtroom and I'm going on unchanged. And so, the scripture has to spell it out. Do not be deceived. The unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God. Notice that word of inherit there, but now you've got a not in front of it. Continue in unrighteousness, and you will not inherit. And then he has to list for us. This is what I'm talking about. Neither the immoral, nor the idolaters, nor homosexuals, nor swindlers, nor drunkards will inherit the kingdom of God. Life must change, because you're in a new house now. But God enables us to change because then he says this, such were some of you, but you were washed, you were justified, you were sanctified. Sanctification's a crucial topic for next week. But today I want you, believers, to enjoy and glory in your adoption and await your inheritance. A long time ago, I was in English class and I had to read Great Expectations a book I actually began with Great Expectations, which were sorely dashed, but I believe it's a book about a poor boy who thinks he's going to inherit great things. And so the book sort of explores how he reacts to this, and how he lives, how he treats people, and how he operates being poor, but having expectations of inheriting something great. And there might be a twist or two in there. Believers have well-founded great expectations. It's a well-founded great expectation because we've been adopted by God Almighty. And this Father, we can inherit without Him dying. He will live forever and we will be with Him. That's the inheritance. So know this, in Christ it is not only that you are forgiven, wonderful though that is, it is also that you are adopted, which means welcomed and loved and you belong. Let us praise our glorious God and give Him glory, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank You that we may address You as Father. We thank You that in Christ we hear, You hear our prayers. And so, Lord, help us to be constant in prayer and to walk before your face with gladness, trusting that you indeed are the loving, all-powerful Heavenly Father. Lord, often we are deceived and we do not walk in this way. We do not have this sight and this understanding. So I pray that you would give it to all of us. We would walk knowing that we have peace with you that you look on us with fatherly love and affection. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen.