We're back to Romans 8. If you'd turn to Romans 8. We took a two-week break, but we're back. We've been going through Romans for a while. Romans chapter 8. Before I begin this morning, I just want to say one of the things that humbles me as a pastor in this church over a long period of time is to realize that When I stand here and share the word that you are listening, I realize that a lot of people go to church and when it's time for the sermon, they tune out for the next half hour. But I know you listen. I appreciate it and it reminds me that there's a lot of responsibility in sharing the word of God. So let's just pray as we begin this morning. Father, thank you. for your precious word. It's a blessing for me to share it. It's a blessing for us as your people to hear it. And so Lord, we want to say thank you this morning. At the same time, we're asking that you give us ears to hear, not just physically, but deeper than that. We recognize that unless you teach us by the power of your spirit, We can make this just a book. And Lord, that's not our desire because that's not what you intend. So Lord, I pray that your word might come to life as we study it together. Thank you for the precious passage this morning. And we ask that we receive it with joy and obey it as you give us the ability to do that. In Jesus' name, amen. So we're in this section of Romans 8 verses 12 through 17. This is kind of a paragraph that's all tied together. Last two times we talked about verses 14 and 15 and this morning we're going to get into 16 and 17. So let's read the paragraph beginning in Romans 8 verse 12. 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. you when you read this paragraph always remember all of it's Paul's arguments are always tight it's after verses 4 through 11 that he comes to verse 12 notice how he starts so then on the basis of what I've said he says we're not indebted to the flesh in any way a matter of fact living for the flesh brings death he says but if by the Spirit by the power of the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body you will live and that doesn't just mean exist that means live eternally have his true life and then in 14 He says, for all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. What a promise that is. And then in 15, we talked about this adoption. God adopts us. And notice the end of verse 15. We cry, Abba, Father. What a blessing, because all who are led by the Spirit are sons of God. And as the Spirit motivates us and empowers us, back in verse 13, to put to death the deeds of the body, we are assured that we're indeed sons and daughters of God. But how did we become sons and daughters of God? It's because of the Father adopted us into His family, and again, We are indeed the children of God. I emphasize and I want to emphasize again this thing of adoption. He has a Roman background. It was a legal process that took place so that when a son was adopted he was truly a part of the family. This is not second class citizenship but this is a real part of the family. But then when you hear that word Abba, that was a word that was used by the Jews to speak of an affectionate way of a father, kind of in our day like Papa or Daddy, full of love and affection in this family. So there we have a little background, that's where we've been. Today we're going to get into verses 16 and 17. If you wanted a title for this message, it would simply be the Spirit's Witness and the Children's Inheritance. So let's talk about the Spirit's witness first in verse 16. Let me read it again. The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. And I'll let that sink in for just a minute. Before we deal with the great truth, we need to deal with a couple of issues for clarification. I mentioned this before, but I need to mention it again since we've been gone for a couple weeks. In verses 14 and 15, He talks about the sons of God. Twice he refers to us as sons of God. Then in 16 and 17 he talks about the children of God. Twice he refers to us as children of God. Why the difference? Some people have made a really big deal out of this and have made basically two classes of Christians. Christians are children of God but only some are sons of God this is a higher level and some would even pursue that into the eternal state where the sons of God will still be above the children of God I don't think I don't think there's any basis in the passage especially when you look at the context for that he uses the words rather interchangeably, but that doesn't mean they have exactly the same meaning. So when he says sons of God, and he does it in association with adoption, I think he's talking about our legal standing, sons and daughters of God. We are truly his sons and daughters. He is our father. But then he, when he uses the word children, this has the family affection atmosphere. We're his children. And that's a beautiful thing so there's there's both the legal side, but there's also the the emotional side if you will of affection in these terms The other thing we need to deal with is verse 16 I grew up on the King James as I know some of you did now some of you are too young to have grown up on the King James But some of us did and so we learned it the spirit itself Beareth witness with our spirit that we are children of God So we want to deal with this, the spirit itself. I found two, I generally look, I have a program where I look at about 33 translations, and two other translations translated it, the spirit itself. So we wanna talk about why. By the way, many of the older translations, even before King James, like Tyndale, Wycliffe, the Bishop's Bible, Geneva Bible, if you're familiar with any of those, they translated the same spirit so they don't have to deal with whether to say himself or itself. The thing to know is the word, the Greek word is nevma we get our word pneumatic from it it means wind breath or spirit depending on the context but it's neuter in the Greek language it's not like English nouns are either masculine feminine or neuter like some other languages you may have studied this word is neuter so I think and I can't prove this think the King James was trying to preserve the fact that this word was neuter so instead of saying himself the spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are children of God now let's think about that for just a minute when you come to John 14 through 16 this is a place where basically Jesus talks about the Holy Spirit all through chapters 14 and 16 and in there 14 times he refers to the Holy Spirit as he. He does this. He will glorify me, chapter 16. 14 times, and the context seems to bear it out. So that brings a question. So in speaking of the Holy Spirit as he, it makes it sound like the Holy Spirit is a person. Is the Holy Spirit a person? Absolutely. He is a person. That's why the King James says, He over and over in John. As a matter of fact, I wrote these down. In those chapters, Jesus talks about the things the Holy Spirit does. He teaches, He brings things to remembrance, He testifies, He glorifies, He convicts, He guides, He speaks, He shows, and He gives. Those are activities of a person. Get this in your mind, the Holy Spirit is as much a person as God the Father and Christ the Son. Now I emphasize this because there are some groups, especially cult groups, who teach that the Holy Spirit is an impersonal force. I'd like to preserve he here, the spirit himself, to emphasize the Holy Spirit is not an impersonal force. That's heresy. The Holy Spirit is God, just like the Father and the Son. Now, it's very common, I find it pretty common to hear Christians talk about the Holy Spirit as it. Some of you probably do that once in a while. And if you do, I'll try to be gentle, but I will correct you. And it's not because I think I'm better or I want to be precise. It's because I don't want to give any energy to the idea that the Holy Spirit is not a person. He is God, and we don't want to call God an it. So everybody got that? So we're clear on that. The spirit himself. Itself is not a good translation. Yes, I like King James, but that is not a good translation. Let's come to the great truth of verse 16. When he says the spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, that is a great basis for assurance. The Holy Spirit witnesses with our spirit that we are children of God. Now we've already seen back up in verse 14 for all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. Now Paul tells us the Spirit who leads us also bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. Now, of what does the Spirit bear witness? That we are children of God. Why do we need that? Why do we need this assurance? Now we talked about this a good bit when we were back in verses one through 11. We need this assurance for several reasons. Children of God sometimes can doubt, have lots of second thoughts. Add to that the fact that there is a real devil who has a legion of angels, demons. He's called the accuser of the brethren, and he can take our doubts and twist them and make them big. Then sometimes we fall into the kind of circumstances that make us question what is going on. And then you add to that our own sins and failures and we can think, I'm not worthy of being a child of God. Some of you, I see, you understand this. So we need this assurance, so Paul tells us, the spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. Now that word bears witness, it's a compound word, it's the regular word to testify or bear witness, but then it's got a little preposition with it that means together with. This would be better, if you wanna read it very literally, the spirit himself bears witness together with our spirit, it's strong. Now It does bring up a question Bears witness to whom The Holy Spirit together with our spirit bears witness testifies to whom We're not told I don't know Because of that, some translations will say, the spirit himself bears witness to our spirit that we are children of God. Wow, that sounds logical. It may sound logical, but that's not the best translation. It says, bears witness together with. So I just have to say, I don't know. What I do know is the emphasis is, Who bears witness? The Holy Spirit and our spirit bears witness together. And this is a way to give us solid assurance that we are children of God. Now the biggest question is this. How does the Holy Spirit bear witness together with our spirit that we are children of God? How does he do this? That question is answered in different ways, and they're not mutually exclusive. Let me give you three. Some would say that the Holy Spirit bears witness by the things he does. For instance, go back to verse 13. In verse 13, again, you can read it, 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. So how do we put to death the deeds of the body? By the spirit, by the power of the spirit. So in other words, the spirit is working. So as the spirit does that and produces his fruit in our lives and does other things, that is his witness that we are children of God. The second answer would emphasize a connection between verse 15 and verse 16. Now notice in verse 15, let me read it again, 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. So it says, by the Spirit, We cry out, Abba, Father. Now, if you turn there, or you can listen, Galatians chapter four. We've read this before because the content is very similar to what we read here. So I wanna read again, Galatians four, verses four through seven. And as we get there, you'll see why. Galatians 4.4, but when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you were sons, God has sent the spirit of his son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father, so you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God. So notice in verse six, here it is the spirit in our hearts crying Abba Father. So in Romans eight, we're crying out Abba Father. In Galatians four, it's the spirit crying out Abba Father. There's no contradiction, I don't think. I think it's simply saying as we cry, and it says it's by the spirit, it's all about the spirit in us crying out Abba Father. Now, Then you read verse 16, the spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. Some would say that the witness verse 16 is talking about is the cry, Abba, Father, in verse 15. That is the witness of the spirit, they would say. And there may be truth in that. The third way of looking at this, how the spirit testifies that we are children of God, focuses on the word Himself. The Spirit Himself bears witness together with our spirit that we are children of God. So the argument goes something like this. Paul is not pointing to the work of the Spirit, but he's pointing to the Spirit Himself. Surely this means that the Spirit gives a direct witness together with our spirit on the inside. This is not something that we deduce. In other words, we could say, well, the Spirit's leading me to wage war against sin. The Spirit is growing His fruit in my life. The Spirit is teaching me to love all my brothers and sisters. Therefore, the Spirit is bearing witness through these things together with my spirit that I'm a child of God. Those who favor this last explanation would say, no. That's not what Paul says. He's not talking about the work of the Spirit because he says deliberately the Spirit Himself. This is a direct personal witness from the Spirit of God. If you take it that way, that emphasizes what I would call the subjective side of the spirit's witness. In other words, it's not something you see with your eyes. This is something, and I hate to use the word feel because we so have problems with feelings, and we should for lots of reasons, but we can't rule that out. So can the spirit give a direct witness so that we sense his witness on the inside? I would say, yes he can. Like I say, these are not mutually exclusive. I believe there's truth in all of them. I believe there's an objective side to the spirit's witness, but there is also a subjective side. So in verse 15, we cry out with feelings, Abba, Father. This is not just about words. You can teach a computer to say Abba, Father, okay? It means nothing. This has to come out of the heart. But now on the other side in verse 16, we're receiving in that same way inside, we're receiving the witness of the spirit. Has an objective and a subjective side. Now, this is the same question now that we ask in verse 15. When does this occur? This witness of the spirit together with our spirit, when does this occur? Some would say this has been occurring ever since we were converted It began then the spirit bearing witness together with our spirit that we're the children of God There are others who would say no This is a witness that comes later on it may come in different ways and so on but it gives further assurance and and some would say some believers never experience this kind of witness of the Spirit now there are some folks that I really respect that take this view that this comes later on they will talk to you about men like Charles Spurgeon DL Moody and many others who even after they were preaching the gospel for years they had an experience that changed their life and they would call this the witness of the Spirit I don't want to discount that And I would say to you you look this out you look this up for yourself you check this out you pray about this but don't believe that that's the focus of this for this reason chapter 8 is all about assurance for believers not just some believers but all believers I believe he's trying to give all of us assurance by saying the Spirit bears witness together with our spirit that we are children of God I do believe it started back when we were converted and it continues sometimes that may be stronger than others but the Spirit does bear this testimony within us now I don't have the answers to all of that. I can't give you, I can't be dogmatic and say, this is the way it happens. But I know it is true. The spirit bears witness together with our spirit that we are children of God. So grapple with these things, pray over this passage. But we do wanna ask ourselves these questions. Are you receiving this assurance from the spirit? Do you see his work in your life? Do you have an inner sense of the witness of the Spirit? I think those are good questions for us to ask. Now, I want to shift now from the Spirit's witness to the children's inheritance. That's what Paul does, but notice, he is very smooth in this. Notice how smoothly he transitions from the Spirit's witness to the inheritance of children in verse 17. Let me start in 16 again. 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. Now, think about this idea of children, our sons and daughters, whichever you want to look at it. Parents are a blessing to children. Now, understand, I'm talking about healthy families. I realize that in the world in which we live, sometimes parents are not a blessing to their children. I understand that. But Paul is talking about the norm in a healthy family. Parents are a blessing to their children. But beyond being a blessing just by their presence and their leading their children, they're also a blessing in that they leave their children an inheritance. My dad died in 2001 and he had this humongous shop and he had so much junk in it you could hardly walk through it. And as we're cleaning and sorting it, I have one sister and her husband, Woody. I asked Woody because he does all kinds of things, he's a handyman. I said, Woody, what do you want out of this? He did not pause, he says, nothing. It's your, I know what you're thinking. He was not being ugly. He was saying, it's yours because you're his son. This is your inheritance, Ron. When I was pulling a trailer home full of junk, I was wondering what kind of inheritance it was. About 10 years later, my mom died. And mom wasn't filthy rich, but she did have some savings, and she left the savings to my sister and myself. We were their heirs, so we received an inheritance. So it is with the children of God. That's what he says here. And if we're children, and the idea is since, since we're children, then we're heirs. Heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ. Now, what does that mean? It means that what God has, his children will inherit. We are heirs of God. Now, if you'd like to turn to 1 Peter chapter one, I love this passage, and you can probably tell because I'm always reading it or quoting it. 1st Peter chapter 1 I want to read verses 3 through 5 and 1st Peter 1 I'll give you a man. I love to hear the pages if you using a phone. I can't hear you, but that's alright 1st Peter 1 verse 3 Blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ According to his great mercy he has caused us to be born again to a living host through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Now listen to verse four. To an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you. Now what that means is the inheritance that we have as heirs of God, you can't touch it. It won't rot, it won't fade, it won't decay, you can't steal it. It's there, it's ours. And he goes on in verse five to say, we're being kept for the inheritance so we'll get there to get it by the power of God through faith. That is he keeps stirring faith up in us so that we will keep trusting him and we will make it to the inheritance. Beautiful. Imagine that. If you are truly in Christ, you are an heir of all that God has. You know, sometimes you hear these things, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Not in this case. It's true. Now, I want to interrupt by asking this question. Is every Christian an heir of God and a fellow heir with Christ? In the Old Testament, You read about how the firstborn got a double portion of the inheritance. But it wasn't so in Roman law. The inheritance was divided equally. And so it is with God's children. I'm simply saying every true believer is an heir of God. Every believer. Now I wonder if this thought ever occurred to you. What about Jesus? Isn't he the rightful heir? He's the true, unique son of God. Yeah, we're sons and daughters of God, but Jesus, he's the real one. We read it earlier up in chapter eight. Sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh his own son his unique son Jesus Christ Surely he is the rightful heir Let me just read to you out of Hebrews 1 long ago at many times and in many ways God spoke to our fathers by the prophets But in these last days he has spoken to us by his son whom he appointed the heir of all things Jesus He's the heir of everything. So how can Paul say that we are heirs? But again, verse 17, and if children, then heirs. Heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ. Now, when we think about inheritance in our world, and like the illustration I gave of my parents, we think about tangible things. Money, stuff, all right? That's what we think about. Now, God has plenty. Okay, what does God own? All of it remember Psalm 50 where he talks about he owns a cattle on a thousand hills if I need something I won't ask you He owns it all but that is not the focus of scripture The focus of scripture is on the intangible things. I wanna read to you from Ephesians chapter one. Now this is a rather long passage. If you wanna look it up, that'd be good, Ephesians one. But I'm gonna go ahead and I'm gonna read all of this. Not the chapter, but verses three through 14. Ephesians chapter one. Beginning in verse three. Listen for the intangibles. 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 to himself as sons 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 in 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. verse 11 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 a guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of His glory. Now, we talked about how the Holy Spirit in that last part, He's the guarantee, the earnest, the down payment of our inheritance. But what I want to focus on is the intangibles in this passage. I've written some down, this is not exhaustive. He talks about spiritual blessings, holiness, blamelessness, love, praise, grace, redemption, forgiveness, wisdom, gospel, salvation, belief, and above all, glory. When you read the New Testament and you read about inheritance, it's talking primarily about these intangible things that you can't get your hands on. God is going to share even his glory with us. Now, if you go back up to verse three in that Ephesians 1 passage, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. What did I leave out? In Christ. That's how he has blessed us with every spiritual blessing, in Christ. So we are heirs God and fellow heirs with Christ Yes, Jesus gets it all But he willingly shares the inheritance with us Isn't that beautiful Galatians chapter 3 let me just read it to you 327 for as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ, then are you Abraham's offspring, heirs according to the promise. Jesus says, I share all the inheritance with you and he does it gladly. The key to our inheritance is our kinship with Jesus. We read it earlier, let me read it again out of Hebrews 2. For it was fitting that he for whom and by whom all things exist and bringing many sons to glory should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering for he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source that is why he that is Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters now I want to read if you want to follow John 17 John 17 the last part of chapter you will not find the word heir or inherit or inheritance in the passage But it's all about inheritance. John 17, and I wanna begin in verse 20. This is where Jesus shift. He's been praying for his apostles that are there with him. But in 20, he shifts and says, I'm not just praying for you guys. So I pick it up in 20. I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that's us. that they may all be one just as you father are in me and I in you that they also may be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me the glory that you have given me I have given to them that they may be one even as we are one I in them you and me that they may become perfectly one so that the world may know that you sent me and love them even as you love me verse 24 father I desire that they also whom you have given me may be with me where I am to see my glory that you have given me because you love me before the foundation of the world. Oh, righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you and these know that you have sent me. I made known to them your name and I will continue to make it known that the love with which you have loved me may be in them and I in them. That's powerful. Jesus is basically saying, Father, The glory that you've given me I've given them I want them to share in the glory that is yours and mine praise God We will share in the glory of the Father and the Son for all eternity Can you imagine a better inheritance than that? So I'm going to save the last part of verse 17 I For next week it goes well with verse 18 as well So we may disagree some about how the Holy Spirit bears his witness but I encourage you to Think about this think about the Holy Spirit bearing witness together with your spirit that you are a child of God now Before we leave this verse and I need to make one additional comment Years ago probably I don't know 35 years ago There was a pastor on the radio in Alamogordo and He told all the residents of the Tularosa Basin we are all children of God I'm not making this up. That's what he said and Now, there are a lot of people today who are buying into this idea of the universal fatherhood of God. In other words, saying everybody is a child of God without exception. Now, that doctrine can be quite appealing if you only look at certain verses in the Bible. But all you have to do to reject that doctrine is to look at these verses right here, or some others in the New Testament, which teach clearly that I was not a child of God until God adopted me, until God gave me the new birth of the Spirit. Now I am a child of God. Have I always been a creation of His? Yes, but that creation, that creation image was messed up in the Garden of Eden. Now God is restoring it as he makes us his children through the new birth and through adoption. So enough about that, but I want us to be really clear. When he tells us that we are children now through this adoption, this is no small thing. This is a big, big deal. So I want us to leave this morning rejoicing That we are children of God, heirs of God, and fellow heirs with Christ. Just use your holy imagination for a moment. So you've got this girl, let's call her Diane. And her parents have hundreds of millions. And she is looking forward to this inheritance. She's gonna rake it in. But you know what? It'll either rot, decay, somebody will steal it, she won't take it with her. Not so with our inheritance. Our inheritance is of such a nature that we inherit all that God has, all that belongs to Christ. It is ours and will be ours for all eternity. Now we don't get all of it now, don't misunderstand me. We get a taste of it now, but it will be ours. You know the revelation passages over there in chapter four and five and seven, where John talks in those passages about how God the Father and Christ the Son are worthy of all blessing and glory and honor and power and might and so on. We're gonna be a part of that. We're going to share in all of that. All that belongs to God the Father and Christ the Son is ours. And again, I don't know how that can be true, except God has made it true and he reveals it to us in his word. We are, I don't know what there is about us. We can become, I'm speaking to myself first, we can become so lackadaisical about the blessings that are ours. If this doesn't excite us, nothing ought to excite us. Praise God. Let's pray. Father, thank you this morning. What a blessing to have your Holy Spirit within us, bearing witness together with our spirit that we are your children. And Lord, I confess I don't totally understand that, but I know it's true. And I know that you want to teach us more about it day by day. Thank you. Lord we are grateful that you've made us your children all of those who are in Christ We truly belong to you as sons and daughters and You've given us an inheritance That nothing can touch that will be ours for all eternity We praise your name this morning. Now I give you just a little time to meditate on that right now. Father, we're memorizing that precious passage out of Psalm 1 that talks about how blessed we are when your Word is our delight and we meditate on it day and night. May we apply it to this passage. And surely that isn't a chore, Lord. We give you thanks, in Jesus' name, amen.