And we come to a portion of God's Word this evening that was written for a reason. And in the circumstances in which the Apostle wrote to the Galatians, he wrote to them as a people who were in danger of accepting bondage again after having received the liberty of sons. And the same danger is before us today, strange as that may sound. There are identifiable external enemies and seducers of the people of God who tempt them backwards towards bondage. At the apostolic days already, there were Judaizers within the church who were seducing the people back to the shadows of the ceremonies and so forth, back into the comparative darkness. And then in the course of history, we see that Satan, he learns and he becomes more subtle and so forth. And so in the Church of Rome, there's a repackaging of the Judaizing error and a more subtle and refined attempt through potpourri to lead people back into bondage to doctrines and commandments of men and to bring them under enslavement to outdated ceremonies, and so on. So there are external enemies and seducers. And then, even if we've gained some ability to recognize the external enemies, there is an ever-present danger that we carry within us, within our own bosom. We have a legal bias, an inclination back towards bondage, and that is within this chapter that we've read there in verse 9, which it's clearly stated, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage. And we might hear from many sides that man has a natural desire for liberty and strives towards achieving liberty. And we don't deny that through the common grace of God, we do have a certain desire for civil liberty, for instance. However strange as it is, man actually has an inclination towards slavery. and desires to be in spiritual slavery. So God, He made us and He placed us under that covenant of works, which now in our fallen condition spells nothing but death. and bondage to us. As strange as it is, man inclines backwards again and again to this covenant of works. And even when God reveals grace in his word and in the gospel, man twists that and perverts that and seeks backwards towards bondage. So we have a problem within and even having revealed to us in the Word, the glorious liberties and privileges of the gospel, we are in constant danger of living below the level of our privileges. And so God, in His mercy, steps in. He doesn't simply hand us privileges and then step back and say, now it's your duty to grasp them and to enter in. to the enjoyment of them. After all, I've done everything for you, and I've given you loads and heaps of liberty, and so you surely at least need to do your part and figure it out yourself and walk in accordance with that liberty. But look, God is willing to even step in to people who can't tell liberty from bondage at times and to instruct us concerning our own privileges. And this is what he's doing in our text in verse 6, which we focus on tonight. And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. Notice how the Word and Spirit work together. And so verse 6 is describing an internal reality of the work of the Spirit in the hearts of believers. But here God comes with His Word, which is outside of us. and shines by His Word, the truth of His Word, upon the inward experience of the heart. And we need that, because if we are left without the Word, we won't even understand Christian experience rightly. So the Word comes and shines light upon Christian experience. And then it works the other way as well. If we've experienced this liberty, and then we hear the Word, which instructs us about the privileges of adoption, then we have something within that echoes what we hear in the Word. And we say, ah, I know what that's like because I've experienced it. So always the Lord works together with the Word and the Spirit together. And we need the Word in order to have more of the Spirit, because how do we receive the Spirit? In chapter 3 in verse 14, we're told that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. So the promise of the Spirit, that's in the Word, that's God speaking. And how do we receive the thing promised in the Word, but faith? So we need the Word and the faithful God to set before us, here's what I've promised you. Here is the work of the Spirit, which I give in the hearts of my children. And then we need to exercise faith. We need to be not passive hearers of the Word, but we need to hear the faithful God speaking in His Word about the work of the Spirit, and believe God that we might receive more of the Holy Spirit. And all of this is a very high duty to maintain against all encroachments the liberty of our sonship. This verse, it is coming to put, if you will, steel into us to stand strong, to stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, which the first verse of chapter five speaks of. It's a high duty to stand fast in Christian liberty. And at the very same time, You know, what could be more comforting for the Christian than to stand fast in the liberty with which he's been made free? And then at the very same time, what could glorify God more than standing fast in this liberty? Because actually, our comfort, precious as it is, useful as it is, strengthening as it is unto all good works, When we stand fast in this liberty of adoption, look who's getting the glory, the triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as we see. God is pleased to glorify Himself. in his triune character, most especially in the redemption of sinners. And so in creation, we get hints and glimpses of the Trinity and some of the glory of God triune is shown forth there, but much more so in redemption. And when we come to the crowning privilege of redemption, which is adoption there, the glory of God triune shines forth. And so this evening, know that it's your duty, if you be in Christ, to stand fast in the liberty and privilege of adoption, and that the end of that is the glory of God. We'll consider this evening the theme of the high privilege of adoption, and we'll consider adoption in three lights. Adoption from the Father, adoption through the Son, and adoption in the Holy Spirit. So first of all, adoption is a privilege flowing from the Father, adoption from the Father. And who God is in Himself, He is Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. The Father being the first person, the Son being from the Father, Spirit from the Son, from the Father and from the Son. And so the father is the first person in the order of subsistence, as we may say, in God himself. But then also in the outworking of redemption, the father is first. And the privileges flow from the father. And in adoption, in particular, we see the love of God. Because just as we were singing there in Psalm 103, such pity as a father hath, The characteristic of a father towards his children is that of love. And in this privilege of adoption, we see several things about the father's love. And one is the freeness of his love. Here in verse 6 we read, Because He are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts. Just notice for a moment that God has an eternal and an only begotten Son. Why is it that He has adopted sons? It is not by any means as if He needed a son. And we could find instances of that in human relationships. One who has no son and who seeks something that he is lacking. Not so in the case of God, who is most perfectly blessed and from all eternity beheld the reflection of all his own perfections in his only begotten son. We are not to think that in adoption that we were somehow good material for being good sons to God, because this chapter there in verse 8, it speaks of what we were. We did service unto them which by nature are no gods, bowing down unto idols. God did not come along and say, here are some servants who are excellent servants. Just like you might think of a man, perhaps a man has no son, but he has servants, and he sees the servant who serves him most excellently, and he says, this servant I will adopt, and I will make him my son, and I will promote him into the position of being my heir, and so forth. Not so at all with us. We were not good servants of God. We had turned to serve other masters, and we rebelled against God as our Lord and Master. But notwithstanding that, in adoption, God comes over top of the mountains of our sin and offense. In the freeness of His love, He has chosen to take sons for Himself. The freeness of His love, the height of His love, is also evident in adoption. This is the highest privilege that we're capable of being received to. You might remember the language of the prodigal son returning, make me as one of thy hired servants. And this, indeed, if we have a sense of our own sin before the Lord, this is as high as our imagination can reach. We deserve to be cast out entirely from the house of God If we should only be admitted back far enough to be a servant, that's the greatest thing we could wrap our minds around. But you know from the parable, how the father in the parable, that he super abundantly exceeded these expectations of the returning prodigal, running and coming and embracing the returning prodigal. In fact, He raises us to the position of sons. He has, as I was mentioning, He has an only begotten and an eternal son. And the level of His sonship is infinitely high above ours. It is a sonship befitting one who is God. that we are creatures. We don't touch it. We don't come unto that position. God forbid that someone should say so. But nonetheless, nonetheless, though the Sonship of Jesus Christ is infinitely above our own, It is yet still the pattern of our relation to God. Because He is the Son, we in Him are adopted sons. He remains God. Notice that. Because He are sons, God have sent forth, and so on. This name God, it sets forth His majesty, and His dignity, and His lordship. And so the first person of the Godhead here is being, particularly in this case, referred to under that divine name of God, as if the Father bears, if you will, the office or the position of God towards us, with all that that implies. It implies that He is to be worshipped. It implies that He is to be feared, that He is to be obeyed, that we are to have a sense of His infinite exaltation above us, and of our lowliness and nothingness before Him. All of that is implied by the word God. It's not erased by grace, but it is infinitely sweetened. because the One who is and whoever remains, God, in all His majesty, is now known by us and served by us and approached by us as a Father. The height of God's love is seen in raising sinners to the privilege of sonship, but also there is the manifestation of this love of God In adoption from the Father, the Father manifests His love. And after all, this is what verse 6 is really about. This is the main thrust, or the main focus of the verse. And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, It implies that we are incapable through reasonings of attaining unto the comfort or benefit of knowing our own sonship or adoption. If God had made us sons, but not manifested his love in adopting us by sending forth his Holy Spirit, we'd be in the dark. because this is a truth that is above reason. It is a truth that is contrary to all of our gloomy fears, the gloomy fears of the conscience, which tell us of all of our many transgressions of God's holy commandments, and they are many indeed, and they say, Surely God will cast you off. How can you be one of the sons of God? All of these gloomy fears would swallow us up if it were not for one thing, that God wants His sons to be assured of their sonship and not to hang in doubt. It is because He are sons that God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father, lest the sons of God should lose in the gloomy darkness of their fears, lest they should lose the comfort of the love of God to them in their adoption, God has sent forth, if you will, a whole person of the Holy Trinity into their hearts continually, effectually, to assure them in a living and active way, as it were, answering each doubt that arises, speaking with a voice that mounts up over top of the thunders of the law and the suggestions of Satan. God manifests his love. So we see adoption from the father. Also this, adoption through the son, and adoption through the son. And because he, our sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, and so forth. The Spirit that assures the sons of God who they are is distinctly called the Spirit of God's Son. And there are several things here to consider. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God's Son, first of all, as He is God. So the Son sends the Holy Spirit. We read the Spirit whom I will send from the Father and so forth. Well, on what basis ultimately is it that the Son sends the Spirit? And we agree that the Son sending the Spirit is something that happens in time. But on what is it based? Well, surely it is based on the fact that the Spirit is from the Son from eternity. If it were merely based on the fact that Christ is the mediator, then it wouldn't be fitting, would it? Because as mediator, Christ stands between God and man. And as mediator, it is that he says, the Father is greater than I. So a divine person, the Holy Spirit, does not obey one who in his position is under God. Rather, it is as God that the Son sends forth the Holy Spirit, who is God. And so it becomes important for us, because in the sending of the Spirit, as the Spirit of the Son of God, the glory of Christ's Godhead is demonstrated. because He is the image of the Father's person, and the Spirit proceeds from the Father, and the Son having all the glory of the Father. Part of the Father's glory is that the Spirit proceeds from Him, and so part of the Son's divine glory is that the Spirit proceeds from Him. So notice that actually that which is most lofty and holy, when we think about the relations of the persons of the Godhead, it becomes very practical in the Christian life. And what a privilege it is that in the Christian life, the high and holy things of God himself are being worked out and demonstrated and manifested because The devil hates the eternal sonship of Jesus Christ. And we know that that's what the devil attacked when he came, tempting Christ in the wilderness. If thou art the Son of God, then command these stones to become bread, and so forth. The devil attacks doctrinally the eternal sonship of the Son. Through the false prophet Muhammad and other prophets, he leads men to revile and spit upon the idea of the eternal sonship of Jesus Christ. He hates it. He attacks it in the Lord Jesus Christ. But he also attacks it in you, believer. He comes and says, how can you possibly be the son, a son of God? and we have no less of a resource than the Spirit of God's Son in the heart to meet the challenge. When the enemy comes in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him. On what basis does the Spirit of God's Son assure you of your adoption while the Spirit who assures you of your adoption is eternally the Spirit of the Son. And so God Himself, the triune God, is your bulwark. The Spirit of His Son, this speaks of the Spirit of God's Son as He is God. also the Spirit of God's Son as He is Christ, as He is anointed. In the fullness of time, He took manhood to Himself, a human nature, and in His manhood, He received in fullest measure the unction of the Holy Spirit. And in his preaching, he said, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he hath anointed me to preach good news, to preach the gospel to the poor. What Christ did, he did by the Holy Spirit, his own Holy Spirit, anointing him to fulfill his threefold office as Christ, or anointed. And this means then, Christian, think about that. Why are you called a Christian? It's because you have this unction. How is it that Christ, the Son of God, lived in the world with all of its temptations and snares and opposition and so forth? Well, He walked continually in the Holy Spirit. How will you live in this world as an adopted Son of God? You will do so by seeking through faith to be continually filled with the Spirit of God's Son, as He is Christ. The Spirit is the Spirit of the Son. And also, finally, as He is exalted Consider Christ as He is exalted and consider that God has sent forth the Spirit of His exalted Son into your hearts. Acts 2.33, God has exalted Christ and He has received that which He poured forth at the day of Pentecost. And so the glory of the exalted Christ consists in part in pouring out the Holy Spirit. That's the glory that comes to Him now by giving forth His Holy Spirit. So we pray in Psalm 45, Thy sword gird on thy thigh, O thou that art most of might. So Christ goes forth through His Word and Spirit, conquering and to conquer and subduing hearts and households and nations unto Himself. And this is the glory of the Son. And this adoption then is through the Son, through the Spirit of God's Son. So that to be Spirit-filled and to be Christ-centered are all one because the Spirit is given forth by Christ and what is His work but to give a view of the glory of Christ. Christian adoption then is adoption through the Son. Finally, This adoption that we're speaking of is adoption in the Spirit. A few things here, and we should have a sense that all theology and all preaching is actually incomplete if it leaves out the work of the Holy Spirit, because this is where everything comes home, if you will. Notice the Spirit's dwelling place. God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, He says. This is speaking of the personal and the intimate presence of God the Holy Spirit in the hearts of believers. His presence in grace, indwelling us even as the glory of God indwelt the temple under the Old Testament. Don't you know that you are the temple of the Holy Spirit? And all of this is true, though we freely acknowledge that the Holy Spirit being God, that He is infinite, He's unbounded, He's omnipresent, He cannot be contained within any finite thing or any creature whatsoever. An unbounded and infinite person who yet is indwelling the hearts of believers. And is that not wonderful? When we consider that we are creatures, finite, limited, we should be crying out the way that Solomon did. Heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain God. How is it that He could dwell in a house made by hands? If Solomon could say that, how much more should we say it about ourselves? How is it that God, whom the highest heavens can't contain, would come in and dwell in me? a finite and limited creature. Much more we should say that when we realize what's in the heart of all places that the Holy Spirit would come to dwell. This is surely the most humbling when we think of everything that's down there in the heart, how there are right up until the Christian draws his last breath, There are the seeds literally of every possible abomination there within the heart. And we praise God for restraining grace that keeps these things from belching forth in all of their full-blown horror. We praise God for grace that is given to mortify and to crucify the deceitful desires of the flesh but yet they are there until we pass from this life and are made perfect in holiness. Think of that. The Holy Spirit dwelling where there is yet so much corruption. If you would think of the snow that we had and how pristine and white it was, and if someone were to perhaps light a sooty fire next to the pristine white snow and how all the black would fall upon the snow, you might wonder, how could the Holy Spirit come and dwell next to a chimney of sooty corruption like the one that's within us? But so He does. In His grace, He is present. It shows the love of the Holy Spirit, doesn't it? It shows that the Lord is full of longsuffering. His dwelling place is none other than your hearts. Not only His dwelling place, but also His operation. God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father, the Holy Spirit dwells within, and He does something. He is active and living within. Now, if it weren't for the rest of the context of Scripture, then we might be, and if we were left to our own devices, then we might go to an extreme when we see this verse. He sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. It might lead us into a direction of ultra passivity. But then we, well, we have to compare Scripture with Scripture, Romans 8, where it says, He sent forth His Spirit by whom we cry. Abba Father, we cry, so we pray, we act, we cry, so don't jettison that truth. However, how is it stated here? Here it said that the Holy Spirit cries. So it's showing us that when we cry, we cannot possibly do so except for the present influence of the Holy Spirit. That the Holy Spirit doesn't just regenerate the Christian or like put some spiritual energy into him like a wind-up toy and then just let him go, but the Holy Spirit has to actively stir up the graces of the Christian. wind has to blow upon his garden the spices thereof may flow forth and this is especially true or it's it's brought right to front and center here what happens in prayer in prayer that all true prayer the Holy Spirit is is working and notice that prayer is here described as as crying and when you cry then surely you are under a pressure of great need, aren't you? I wonder, children, if you've ever cried out for help. Maybe you did. Maybe you cried to your father, your mother today. You lifted up your voice. Why did you do that? It's because you had a sense of pressure and need that was overwhelming to you. And it wasn't enough simply to say in a calm voice, you know, Daddy, would you please pass the salt or something. Rather, it was from a sense of danger or distance. You cried out. And so it is with the Christian. In true prayer, the Christian oppressed with a sense of need, and yet, He sends forth a mighty cry that prevails over his sense of felt distance from God. And he comes drawing near to God as a father with confidence. And even he does so in the image and likeness of Jesus himself. who used these words in Gethsemane, Abba, Father, when the cup was presented there before him, and he had a holy, innocent aversion from the bitterness of the dreadful cup, though a willingness to drink it, but he felt his weakness, and he said, Abba, Father, And so when you, Christian, you pass through that experience, you're willing, and out of your affection to God as a Father, you want His will to be done, but you are overwhelmed. You see something that is going to empty you and exhaust you, and you cry to God for help, crying, Abba, Father. That's the work of the Holy Spirit. His operation. Also, notice His language. Crying, Abba, Father. There's a great simplicity to the language. Simply two words, which are a summary of all Christian prayer. Abba, Father. Now notice that there are words. because the Word and the Spirit work together. So God comes to us by His Word, and He brings it home to the heart and quickens us by His Holy Spirit, and we should return back to God with words. We should open our mouth, and we should speak to God, yes, even audibly in our prayers and in our praises. There are words. But yet, notice how simple these words are, how broken, as it were, the expression is, that it's not even a complete sentence. And so it is with you, Christian, so many times. When you come, there's prayer, there are words, but you can't even finish the thought. As you cry to God, there is an oppressive sense of weight that it's actually a miracle of grace that you can even pray at all. And the only thing at times that escapes from underneath of the great burden that you feel are a few broken expressions of crying to God as a Father. You have desires that are large and boundless. that you can hardly put into words. You're never satisfied with the way that you express yourself in prayer because the desires that you have, they go beyond what you're able to say. Here we have simplicity in the language. We also have intensity. because the expression is doubled, two words that mean the same thing, Abba, Father. Here we have an intensity of reverence towards God. Notice in this short summary of Christian prayer how God-centered it is. a sense of God upon the soul, our Father, which art in heaven, His greatness and His highness, an intense reverence for God, and at this very same time, an intense confidence in God as my Father, as if it were not content to grip Him one time with one word or one expression of faith, as if it wouldn't be enough simply to say Abba or to say Father, but both, gripping God with both hands, Abba, Father. And there is, may we say, an ecumenicity in this language of Christian prayer. And the idea of ecumenicity has been abused unto the undoing of all Christian truth, and it's been used as a backdoor for compromise and so on. I trust you know that. But nonetheless, there's a good sense, too. Because how many fathers are there? There is but one Father in heaven. How many families does He have? Only one. All the brethren and all the sisters, all the children, meet together before one throne of grace and cry to the same Father, by the same Spirit, through the same Son. Even people whose faults you can see or whose errors you know and you can diagnose. and I'm not saying that their errors are permissible or that their faults are permissible or good, but then your faults aren't good either. What do we have but one family of faulty children who are meeting together at one throne of grace, calling upon one Father, and even, you know, what's the greatest division? It's the one distinction that the Bible acknowledges, the distinction between Jew and Gentile. So over here we have the Jews, over here the rest of the nations, everyone's together in one big pile called the Gentiles. So that distinction is made in the Bible, but that Jew and Gentile meet together and will meet together before the throne of grace. So Abba, there you have an Aramaic word, which was the common language of the Jews in the days of the apostles. And then you have a Greek word for father. So Jew and Greek meeting together at the throne of grace, filled by one spirit, crying to one father through the Son. and may God bring it more and more to pass in practice, in history, and in the world. We've considered this evening a very direct text of Scripture. And because ye are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts. crying, Abba Father. It's notable how God speaks so directly sometimes. And there are certain ifs and so forth that could have been put in here. If you, reading Galatians or hearing preaching from Galatians, You know, if you've been converted and so forth, and your sons, and God sent the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, it would be legitimate to say that. But notice that the point that we're driving at here this evening is a point of comfort and the comfort of adoption. And God knows how prone His children are to be swallowed up with a lot of ifs and fears, and, well, maybe I don't really qualify, or maybe I'm shut out because of this or that. And so for His weak children, as it were, God cuts through all of that, and He speaks to you directly, and He says, And he says, God has done this for you. He has sent forth his spirit into your hearts so that you might take the comfort and you might apply it to yourselves without doubt or hesitation immediately. And then there could be the case that you've been listening to all this this evening, and you're a stranger to all this experience. So the Christian can know that he's the child of God, and he can know that the Holy Spirit is working in his heart to lead him through the son to the father to call upon God as a father. But then you can also know that you've never had that experience. You can know that you don't reverence God as a Father. You don't come near to Him with childlike confidence. You don't come through the Son. A crucified Savior is not precious to you. The Holy Spirit has not yet cried in your heart. If that's your position this evening, then I want to speak equally directly to you. Because God, He speaks so directly in His Word to sinners. And God is willing to give this gift to you. And He tells us that because He's a Father, and because He's a far better Father than us evil fathers, that He will surely give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him. And so why does He tell you? If you've been devoid of the spirit of adoption until this evening, why does He tell you these things about adoption? Not to tantalize you with something He's gonna dangle in front of your eyes and then snatch away. He's telling it to you because He's willing to give it to you. And what does He want you to do? But to ask. Give me the Holy Spirit and He surely will. May God then bless His word to us.