Garrett ended Sunday with 10 implications of our adoption into the family of God. I simply want to restate them as a reminder of the enormous gift we have been given in Jesus Christ.
ONE | We are free from the orphan’s burden to be good enough to receive God’s favor. God’s favor rests on us because God’s favor rests on Jesus, and we are clothed in his imputed righteousness alone.
TWO | We are free from the orphan’s lack of trust in God’s goodness or trustworthiness. If God did not hold back the costliest gift he could have given in order to justify and adopt us into his family, there is nothing God will withhold from giving us to secure of praise of his glory and our good.
THREE | We are free from the orphan’s insecurity in communication with God. As adopted children in God’s family, we can boldly approach him in prayer as one of his messy, broken and needy children.
FOUR | We are free from the orphan’s compulsion to cover up failures in order to be accepted by others. We are forgiven, accepted and adopted children of God, what do we have to fear?
FIVE | We are free from the orphan’s tendency to hold onto hurts that others have been done to us. “We love because he first loved us.” —1 John 4:19. We forgive others because our sins have been forgiven by Jesus.
SIX | We are free from the orphan’s inclination to compare ourself with others in order to feel superior or justified. We are justified by God’s grace as a gift, not by how we stack up with respect to others; we should rest in the approval of God through Christ.
SEVEN | We are free from the orphan’s defensiveness in response to personal sin or failures being pointed out by others. We should be freed from the orphan’s compulsion to be right in every situation, at all costs.
EIGHT | We are free from the orphan’s impulse to complain and be bitter. We are adopted children who are treated infinitely better than we deserve.
NINE | We are free from the orphan’s bleak future. Our future as justified sinners and adopted children of God is so secure that Paul refers to our after-death glorification as past tense. As far as God is concerned, our future already happened. We have a glorious, secure future.
TEN | We are free to enjoy and delight in God as our loving Father who wants our best. We don’t have to create our own identity or seek our own success. We can trust Him and be assured that His commands and direction WILL end in His glory and our joy.
In Him, to the praise of His glorious grace.