Relating to God as Our Father

I could listen to Eileen talk all day, but now you get me. So Galatians chapter four verses one through seven. Even as we’re just hearing about caring for one another, bearing one another’s burdens, I’ll remind you that I Peter, chapter five, tells us that we can cast our anxieties on the Lord, because He cares for us. So when we care for each other, really what we’re doing is we’re expressing the care of God, we’re, we’re being a tangible expression of that truth. We need to be reminded of that, don’t we, that God cares for us.

In our text today, in Galatians, actually, we touched on the fatherly love of God last week, as something when we come out from underneath the law, and we come into Christ, we come into relationship with God as Father, and that’s where our text guides us again today. So we get to really spend our entire time thinking about that, what does it mean that God is our Heavenly Father? How do we relate to him as father. So as we turn to that today, he has been my prayer for you all week is just Lord would you give us regardless of your experience of fatherhood, here on Earth, my prayer for you has been if it’s been a great experience of fatherhood, that you’d be refreshed, and renewed an understanding of what it means to relate to God as Father, I think often we relate to God as Father, according to what our experience of a father has been. I don’t know if that’s been good or bad for you absent or present, I don’t know. But I can tell you is when the scriptures paint a picture of who God is, as Father, it is a rich and deep thing. My hope is that today, if you maybe begin to slip into experience of just saying, I kind of relate to God as distant or cold, or I begin to relate to God as absent. Or maybe the idea of father is scary to me, because of my experience, that you would let the word of God in all sufficiency, speak to you about who God is, as your father. So what I want to do is just walk us through the texts that we’re going to look at.

All right, we’re going to walk through the seven verses together, I’m going to read it and just try to walk you through it. And then I’m going to give you seven biblical themes beyond just this text, seven biblical themes that have what it means to relate to God as Father so that we can begin to understand that I find again and again, when I talk to folks, they’re like, Yes, I know, God is father, but I don’t know what that means in terms of today. They’re supposed to relate to God. I want to give you seven ways you relate to God, because He is our Father. The way the Scripture speaks about that. So let’s look at chapter four verses one to seven, and I’m going to do it a little different than I did it first service. I’m gonna read and then stop and comment as I go. Everybody okay with that? Kind of doesn’t matter if you are or aren’t. He says this in verse one, I mean that the air, as long as he is a child is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything. But he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father. In the same way, we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. Now pause there, here’s what here’s what Paul is saying to the Galatians. He’s been talking about this idea of being under the guardianship of the law, we learned last week that the law is this harsh taskmaster, that’s what that word meant. It’s actually using a different word for Guardian here, it gets translated the same way. But it’s a more neutral term. It’s not a harsh taskmaster, until we see who the taskmaster who the Guardian is, in this passage. So here’s what he’s just said, he’s painting the picture before Christ came into the world, all those that God would eventually adopt and call his own. We’re living like, no different than slaves. What he means is, there’s a huge difference between a child and a slave. But in this sense, there’s no difference, until a child receives the inheritance until they have the inheritance until they’re the heir living in the inheritance that they have. They don’t have it, just like the slave doesn’t have it, neither of them have the inheritance, the father will eventually give to the child. That’s what he’s saying. He says, You are no different than slaves. Then he goes on to say, you were slaves to the elementary principles of the world. That term principles can also be translated spirits. What Paul is saying there is before God sent Christ into the world, whom he would adopt you through Christ, and through the work of Christ. Before that, though, Galatians, you were living underneath the authority of the demonic, you are living under the authority of the devil he had, in a very real way, ownership of you, you were living underneath that kind of slavery. That’s what he’s getting at. He’s talked about that the penalty of not perfectly fulfilling the law is that we are separated from God. That’s essentially what he’s saying again, here, similar theme to what we’ve seen thus far in Galatians. Now go to verse four with me, because he now turns it and he says, But in verse four, but when the fullness of time had come, just full stop there. Do you see what he’s saying? Whatever he’s about to say comes after this. It happened not a moment too soon, and not a moment too late. In the fullness of time. We When needed come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. So here’s what he’s just done. He said, You were enslaved to dark spiritual forces. You had not inherited what God intended for you to inherit. But then at just the right time, God sent Christ into the world, the revelation of the mystery of God and how He would redeem and how he would save. What I want you to see is in one verse there in verse four, he highlights both the divinity of Christ and the humanity of Christ, when He says, God sent forth his Son, that’s a declaration that this is the divine Son, the second person of the Triune God, and that in his divinity, he then came, but he wasn’t just fully divine, he was also fully human, because he said, very next phrase, born of a one woman, born under the law, those are both human realities. So he’s saying, Christ, the Son of God was born at just the right time, not a moment too soon, not a moment too late to execute the plan of God in all of history. at just the right time, God sent His Son, and in sending His Son, then he had him be fully human, born just like every humans born born of a woman, born under the law, in other words, the requirements of the law, were upon him as a human being just like they’re upon you and I, they must be kept perfectly. Here in this one phrase, is a reminder that as divine, Jesus is able to perfectly keep the law as human, he’s able to having kept that law perfectly, he’s able to make payment for you and I, because he’s one of us. He is man, human born of a woman, born under the law, and because he kept it perfectly, he was able to make payment for you and I, it’s a hugely pivotal text, and understanding what it means what happens. He says, in order to redeem those who are under the law, the idea of redeeming is, is purchasing back something. So Christ through his work purchased us for God. In doing that, then says, now all of this tax leads towards this next sentence and what comes after so everything up to that point we’ve heard before something similar to it in Galatians. But now he’s going to take it a step further, after he says, born to redeem those who are under the law, what is the last phrase in verse five there, so look, again with me to redeem those who are under the law, so that we might receive what’s the word, their adoption, as sons. This is what he’s saying. He’s saying, this whole process was not just about redeeming you, because he could redeem you do what we’ve called justify you make you legally right with God, he could do that and never adopt you. He could redeem you to be his servant, he can redeem you to be just someone that is somehow connected to him, but he didn’t just redeem you for that purpose. All of that leads to his next phrase, he redeemed you in order to adopt you, in order to bring you into His household to make you his son, or his daughter. Then he just going to spend the next few verses explaining that further. He says, and because you are sons, or we can say, daughters, 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 than an heir through God. So what I want you to see is this whole text builds towards those last two and a half verses, it’s all meant to point towards this idea of adoption. Do you see that? Yes. It’s all pointing us right there, all the previous verses, before the fullness of time had come, this was our condition. Then Christ came, he was born a human, he was fully divine, he did this work to redeem us. He redeemed us in order to adopt us. So now what this text calls for us, for us to reflect upon, okay, if he’s adopted us, and He is our Father, how should we relate to him?

So I want to I want to help you see seven themes of how we as sons and daughters of God, if you are in Christ, he has purchased you for God made you God’s Son. I want to show you how that means we’re supposed to relate to God. Let me just ask this, let me just say this, I need you to let the word of God speak. I don’t have a magic pill to heal you the whatever damage was done in your life related to fatherhood. I don’t have that. But what I do have is God’s word, which is sufficient. It speaks to us about who he is as a father. I just want to invite you to let it speak. Just to say the Lord, I’m open to hear what you say about yourself as a father. I’m open to hearing that I’m not shutting that down because of whatever I experienced. I’m gonna listen. I want to encourage you. There’s healing to be found in that for whatever No harm is in your background. There’s a reawakening if you’ve taken a great father for granted, for those of us who are fathers, there is a call to live like our Heavenly Father, to be this kind of dad. There is healing to be found. Here’s what I, here’s what I promise you, and I’ll show you why in this text in just a moment, if you will commit yourself to understanding what it means for God to be father and to relate to him. As such, you will find that over time, whatever needs to take place in your life, for healing to come, will come. There’s a reason why is because the spirit is testifying to you about the Fatherhood of God, and He will bring that about. But it’s hard work. Yes. It can be hard work. So we come to God’s word to do that work.

Now, let’s talk about seven things. Okay, here’s number one. And we’re going to hit them each pretty quickly. Because as Eileen said, she stole a bunch of my time. Number one, how do we relate to God as our Father thing number one in Scripture is love. We relate to him in love. Now, none of this is gonna you I’m probably not gonna say anything of the seven things you’re gonna do, I would have never guessed. Okay. But the first thing and I think the primary thing it means to relate to God in love is this is that we approach God convinced that he loves us, and committed to returning that love to him. Convinced that he loves us. Now, let me help you with that. It’s just you’re thinking what? You know, I just can’t, I can’t just say, convince myself that God loves me. I get that’s hard. But I want to, I want to help you in this way. Okay? One, keep going back to the scripts, keep washing yourself in the water of the word, let it testify to you. Okay. But here’s the thing, to be convinced that God loves you is not first and foremost, an emotional experience. It’s an objective reality. Because it’s objective, it’s, it’s sitting there, as real as the nose on your face. It’s as real as the pin you’re holding in your hand right now. It’s as real as the chair, you are sitting in the love of God for you, as his son or daughter is an objective reality. Now, let me help a little further with that. Because if it’s objective, and it’s real, then it’s there to be experienced. Would you agree with that? It doesn’t ebb and flow based upon my emotional state, doesn’t ebb and flow based on my experience, it is real. Now when I say it’s an objective reality, when we talk about God adopting us as His sons or daughters, First John chapter three, verse one, Behold, what kind of love the Father has given to us, some texts, say, lavished upon us, that we should be called Ye, sons of God, or daughters of God. In others, we do things, my adoption of you this theological, objective reality of my making you part of my family, of my adopting you, that is a grand and great expression of love. So it’s there for you to understand and further access, an understanding of God’s love. That’s what he’s saying. They are tied together, I gave my son to bring it about. Now we often talk about theologians or about the order of salvation. So we think about terms and theological ideas like election, like regeneration, like calling, we think about justification, which we’ve talked about a lot. Right, legal standing, forget everything about sanctification, which is being made more like Jesus day by day by day through the power of the Spirit. We talked about glorification as part of the order of salvation. These are all objective theology, theological realities. glorification is when Christ returns and we’re made completely like him. Right? We’ll see Him as He is, and therefore become like him, John says. So those are fantastic. Do you know that one of those objective theological realities in the order of salvation that theologians have talked about for 2000 years is adoption. Everyone who has been justified, made legally right with God has also been adopted, the two are synonymous with one another. In other words, there’s no one that God says, I’m going to justify you, but not adopt you. If you have been justified, you have been adopted. Every single person because God doesn’t just aim to create a group of servants. He aims to create a group of sons and a group of daughters. God did not need to adopt us, but he has by his free choice and is one of the greatest and grandest expressions of His love for us. That’s the first we relate to him convinced of his love. Now, let me ask how do you relate to someone when you’re absolutely sure they love you? And when you know that, you know that you know, and you have no doubt about have you had someone who’s loved you that way. I hope you have It’s a spouse, maybe it’s a friend. You’re not tentative with that person or you. You’re not cautious. You don’t walk on eggshells. You don’t you don’t walk around going on. Yeah, if I do this, you just, you just are so certain. You walk with comfort and you’re willing to be vulnerable. There is a, there’s a, they’re going to understand. Does that mark the way you relate to God? Just ask that question. Does that mark the way you relate to God? Are you certain of his love for you? His fatherhood is meant to help you understand that.

The second way that the second theme around fatherhood, in the way we relate to God is familiarity. Now, this one you might not have expected me to say, familiarity, that we relate to God with a sense of familiar affection, is part of what it means to relate to God as Father. Now let me show you where I get this from. In the text. We just read Galatians four, six hears the words that we heard, and because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit that’s the Holy Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father. Now that word ABA is an Aramaic word and it’s a term of close affection and familiarity. That’s what that word is. It is. You might almost think about like a nickname. It’s God saying you can call me this close, affectionate name. No one who’s not mine can call me that. But you can call me this. Right. So my kids are Kinley, Emerson and Deacon. My wife and I are the only people in the world who call them Kbear, Emepi and Dman. Right? You should not walk up to my daughter and call her Kbear. She will be weirded out. But I call her that. They are the only three people in the world who call me dad. No one else. They’re the only ones if you call me dad also weird. But not them. They address me with a sense of familiarity, don’t they? They don’t come to me with hesitancy or like, oh, I don’t know if I can come to dad. They just come in like Dad, dad. I mean, how many Dad Dad Dad, Dad? Dad, dad, dad, dad, dad? Okay, yes, I hear you. That’s what got me when he says the Spirit. Now here’s what I want you to get. Because there’s a subtle difference between this and the Romans eight texts. I’m gonna give you it says almost the exact same thing says the Spirit of the Son is crying out and crying. It’s intentional, not just saying, crying out, almost as if he knew we would need this sort of emphatic voice in our spirit saying to us, you may speak to God this way. The Spirit is in you. If you’re in Christ, the Spirit is in you saying you can call God Abba. You can call him dad. You can come to him with this kind of familiar then once you think about the miracle that this is through the grace of Christ. Because under the old covenant before the New Covenant came in Jesus shed his blood so that we can be reconciled to God. Under the Old Covenant. The Hebrews would not write or say the personal name of God, His Name is Yahweh. That’s how he revealed himself. In English, the transliteration of that would be WAHWEWYEH. But in the scriptures, when you read them, they take out all the vowels, they only write the consonants. So WHWH, or in Hebrew, yet hit yote hit vab hit is what’s called the tetragram. They would not even write the name of God, the personal name of God, they would not speak it when they came to Yahweh in the text, those four letters, they would say, Adonai, which means Lord, because they would not take the holy Pure Name of God upon their lips, under the Old Covenant, he was to Holy, could not be approached in this way. Now under the New Covenant, because the righteousness of Christ has been given to all who are in God. We find Paul saying, you can come to God and not only can you say his name, you can call him dad. You can call him Abba. That’s the miracle of the cross of Jesus. Do you see it? Yes. It’s brilliant. It’s beautiful. Come to me with familiarity. Now, listen to Romans chapter eight, almost the same words, but one slight difference, if you notice what the difference is Romans 815. For you to 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, same thing. What was the difference? Anybody catch it? Who’s doing the crying in that verse? In Galatians? Four, it’s the spirit saying to you, Trent, you may call me Abba. And then Romans eight says, having heard that testimony, we cry Abba we say, Dad, we come to him with that kind of familiarity. Friends, if you’re not approaching God with a sense of familiarity that a father wants a son and a daughter to have with him, you’re not approaching him as father, if you’re approaching him as cold or distant or infrequently, that is not what the Scriptures say about what it means to relate to God as Father to relate to God, his father is to approach him, like your familiar friends. He welcomes. The blood of Christ has made it possible, do not say to yourself, I’m honoring God by treating him as distant and other No, that is not the message of the New Covenant and the gospel of Jesus, it is you have been brought nearer to God through Christ. You may speak to him as your Abba. I hope that says I hope that ministers to you.

Number three theme about the way we relate to God, his father, and again, this is all are you relating to God this way, is trust, trust, we relate to God as our Father, when we trust him. Now, fathers are supposed to be trustworthy. I’m very sorry if you had a father who wasn’t. But God aims to show you that he is. He is your trustworthy father, Matthew 6:31. nd 32 Say, Therefore do not be anxious, saying What should we eat? Or what shall we drink? Or what shall we wear for the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father, your heavenly Father knows that you need them. Now here, he’s talking about trusting God to provide but broaden that a little bit, because we could go all sorts of places in scripture where as a father, he doesn’t just provide our needs, like food, shelter, clothing, he says, He provides by leading us He provides by guiding us, He provides by protecting us. So there’s this provision that we lean upon him for. And let me just say that to trust God is to do two things is to trust is to trust that we can follow the leading of His Spirit, and He will catch us in places he’ll take care of us, in places where going out by faith puts us possibly in danger, even risking things, but also to trust him, is to see that his is to say, I will follow what you’ve said is life giving, I will follow your commands. That’s part of trusting God, to say I’m gonna live the way I think is best is to deny that God’s commands are life giving and trustworthy, that he has declared to you. What is right and good for you. So that’s what we’re talking about when we talk about trust. I think about this as a father. I think this is a dad thing. If you’re a dad, did you love when your kids were little, and maybe they are just chucking them as high as you can in the air. It’s really no one. This is like my favorite thing as a dad. Here’s why. Because I love the look on their one. Yhey giggle and they laugh. There’s no harder belly laugh than when I chuck them. It’s always a good foot or two higher than mom is comfortable with that, which is why I say it’s a dad thing, right? Dad’s chucked her kids in the air, and they get the big egos and mom’s like, and you’re like, it’s good. I’m teaching them trust this biblical what’s happening here? So yeah, you’re throwing them. The look on their face is just sheer joy, because why dad’s gonna catch me. I trust Dad, that’s got me, right. That’s why it’s fun. As a dad, by the way, it’s not just fun, because we like to come real close to injuring our kids. It’s fun, because we see the joy in their face when they trust us as their father. When they know Dad’s got me, I’m good. So I can go higher and higher and higher. You know what else dads, our kids get older, and we can’t chuck them anymore. That’s a good reminder that they need a father bigger and stronger than us. So all my teaching trust better not be just teach them to trust me. Better be teaching them to trust the God who is strong enough to always catch them in any circumstance, because my strength has limits. That’s what we’re aiming to do. We relate to God as Father when we trust him.

Fourth theme, generosity, we relate to God as Father, when we believe that he’s generous and wants to be generous. When here’s what that looks like, when we believe here’s what believing the generosity of God as a father is when we believe that He wants us to have everything that’s good for us. God wants us to have everything that is good for us. We asked him for them. That’s what it means to relate to God. When’s the last time you asked God? To be generous with you? Do you know that your heavenly Father, that’s what it is to be a father, your Heavenly Father’s want to pour out blessings upon them because we have this conversation in our house. You know, regularly when our kids have done something wrong. You say look You need to understand that your dad’s first heart is not to punish your dad’s first heart that my greater desire, I punished when I need to. I want to give you gifts in abundance. That’s what I want to do. It’s my instinct to do that. It’s my, the fulfillment of my joy, to pour out good things upon you. At times, I want need to discipline because you make a poor choice. That’s not what I want to do. That’s what I do, because it’s right. What I want to do is give you every good gift I could possibly imagine giving you and when my kids believe that, do you see that it changes the way they relate to me. They don’t walk around me going deserts looking for an opportunity to punish. He’s just waiting for an opportunity to come down hard on me. That’s what that is. Oh, is Dad’s favorite moment. That’s my least favorite moment. I don’t love punishing I don’t love disciplining. I want. I want to give good gifts. That’s what God is saying to us. Listen to these texts. I got three for you here because it’s so rich. Matthew seven, verse 11. If you then who are evil human beings know how to give good gifts to your children. How much more will your Father who is in heaven, give good gifts to those who asked him, we can ask our father for good gifts, not just our needs, by the way, we can ask him to be exceedingly generous, and he is Ephesians one, three to five. Bless it be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ, with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. Not some, not a few. Not just enough, 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 what church adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of as well. Then I’ve said this before, but I think maybe the richest promise in all of Scripture, Romans, chapter eight, verse 32, He who did not spare His own Son, but gave him up for us all. How will He not also with Him graciously, graciously give us all things. That’s uh huh. Do you see how big that promises? What God is saying there is I love to be generous with you. So much so that I gave you the thing that was hardest for me to give. That is my own son. He laid down His life for you I sent him he went willingly and joyfully to accomplish redemption. What would be harder for me to give than that? So why would you think I wouldn’t be generous with you? Why would you relate to me as if I’m a begrudging gift giver? I’ve given you the hardest thing that there is to give and having given that for you, you never need doubt that I will give you everything that I deem good for you to have. If it’s good for you, I will give it I will delight to give it He’s generous. Do you relate to God is generous? I find far too often, I think, yeah. I mean, there’s probably a limit on this. God, is he No, no, I gave you my son. How would you doubt my generosity.

Number five, theme, obedience. We’re just going to cover these last three here, we’re gonna move a little quicker. He’s the first four I think are they require a lot more depth. But these last couple, obedience, we relate to God as our Father, when we love to obey His commands and follow the leading of His Spirit, Romans 814 and 15 say this, for all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. In other words, what he’s saying is, this is what a father does for a son, for a daughter, he leads them. It’s by the Spirit that He leads us. There’s no one that would call him father whom He will not lead, whom he will not give guidance to. So that’s great news is like, How many times have you been in a situation like, I have no idea what to do? He says, I’ll lead you. The spirit is there and I’ll lead you through the Spirit. Pay attention. Listen, expect me to lead you. I mean, how often have we made decisions and never actually consulted God? Never asked. Never saw him. Never thought he’ll lead me and just tried to chart our own way. He said, Well, I’m your father. I’m here for this. I’m here to give you guidance. Come. First, John, chapter five, verse three through four say this for this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments, and His commandments are not burdensome. For everyone who has been born of God, to son or daughter overcomes the world. what John is saying there is that to relate to God, his father, to be born of God is to not find his commands burdensome, but to follow them, because we recognize that he’s so good, he’s not giving commands to us. Just to be burdensome, just to him as in, he’s doing that out of love.

Alright, number six, a somewhat obvious theme when it comes to fatherhood is discipline. The number six theme that we see in Scripture about how we relate to God as fathers that he relates to us as in discipline that points now here’s what it mean. Here’s what that means. It means to relate to God as Father, we accept His discipline willingly when it’s needed. Now, we already said this is not God’s first heart, as father, but it is something God does wrong. Hebrews 12, five through seven says, My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him, for the Lord disciplines, the one he loves. Discipline is an enactment of the love of God disciplines the one he loves and chastises every son whom he receives. So his discipline is not made to push us further away, which is sometimes what we experienced growing up, discipline is pushing away. This is discipline to be brought near. He disciplines the child he what receives so it’s discipline that draws closer. It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons, for what son is there whom his father does not discipline, good fathers discipline their kids. Because they need to be corrected, because they need to be kept out of jeopardy and, and consequences that their decisions might lead to. So good fathers discipline their kids, but God disciplines us in order to draw us into himself and further down the road of life and joy and fullness and fulfillment. So our job as his children is to receive that discipline when it comes now God is not a disciplinarian, who says, Now you should know what you did. That’s not how God disciplines he does not if you’re wondering, like, what if this bad thing happened in my life because God was disciplining me. God does not leave you to wonder. When you’ve walked in sin and you know it, and you receipt, you receive correction from the Lord. There are circumstances God brings into our life that are difficult circumstances at times, because of sin patterns in our life to correct those. That’s a clear pattern in Scripture. Where that happens, though, here’s what you can know. God is not passive aggressive about his discipline. He does not sit back and go, we figure it out. He will always reveal our sin to us. Make it clear the pathway of repentance to us so that we might walk in it and he will remove his disciplinary hand when we walk in heartfelt repentance, confession and repentance. He is not looking to keep his hand of discipline on us, just so that he can keep disciplining us Do you understand this? deeply important? He disciplines us because He loves us, not because he is antagonistic towards us. I like what Millard Erickson a theologian said about this. He said, fatherhood in God will always involve discipline, because God is our Heavenly Father, not our heavenly grandfather. I like that. Because the man and I talk all the time. We’ve said to our parents, like yes, you can correct our children. If you see something needing to be corrected feel, you know, yes, of course you can correct them. But we also want to free them to not need to correct our children because we want them to be grandma and grandpa. We want the kids to not think I’m going to diss them. We want them to like fill in with sugary snacks and give them the ice cream and spoil them and then we’ll detox them when they come back. All right, we will undo all the damage after the fact. Grandparents aren’t the disciplinarians. They’re not meant to be fathers were the disciplinarian mothers come alongside. We discipline our children. And we let grandparents be free from that. And grandparents all said Amen. Right. Yeah, I don’t want to be the disciplinarian. I want to be the one that they are like, I can’t wait to get to Grandma’s house because the sugary cereal is going to come out. Right now. Grandparents, please don’t say Pastor Trent gave me permission to do whatever I want with my grandchildren. Don’t say that to your kids. But you get the point. Right? I like what Erickson says there. God is our Heavenly Father. So He disciplines us.

Last thing that we see here and there’s others but these are the seven that I think stand up most consistently in Scripture is thankfulness. If you’re going to relate to God as Father, it means constantly giving thanks to him. We thank our Father because He is Generous because he leads us because he protects us because he’s a good father Ephesians 5:19 and 20 says that the body is singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart. He’s talking to the church saying sing and make melody to the Lord in your heart with your heart. Then he says Giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. So, when we come to Him as Father, we come with thanksgiving. Is that a regular pattern in your life as you talk to the Lord? Do you give thanks to Him? Do you find yourself overflowing with thanks that’s part of what it means. means to relate to him as your father. Look, this isn’t natural. How many of you have children? How many times have you had to tell them to say thank you to someone? Say thank you say thank you say thank you say thanks. I mean, it’s like a never ending task to teach our kids is to say thank you say thank you say thank you. Because it’s not natural to us to do that. Would you please take that in your relationship with the Lord and recognize that you’re probably not giving thanks the way that you should? Say, Holy Spirit, would you instruct my heart the way I instruct my children to keep thanks, would you instruct my heart to give thanks, because part of what it means to relate to God his Father, not all this church family, those are seven themes. This whole passage points us towards the fact that we have been adopted this grand theological reality, it’s an objective reality. In that, I want to give you the gift of beginning to relate to God as Father, not the way your experience tells you to relate to a father. But the way the word of God tells you to relate to a father. Because the Spirit is in you, crying out Abba, Father, in teaching you how to come to God as a father, if you will stay the course and that the healing the wholeness, the joy of having this father, it will come. I know it’s hard, may take diligent work, stay with it. The light of the joy of your heavenly Father will break upon you.

Let’s pray. Father, we thank You that You are our father through Jesus Christ, that He has purchased us and redeemed us. Not just redeemed us so that we will be justified and your servants but redeemed us so that we would be your kids. So help us to come to you in all the ways your Word tells us to come to you. We didn’t we’re not relying on our own opinions here about what it means to relate to as a father, we look to your word and we thank you that in your generosity, you’ve given us that word, and told us that we can be fully convinced of your love. We can expect your generosity, we can come to you and give thanks. We can trust that your discipline is never harsh, but always just right. And we can receive it. So help us to relate to you as our Heavenly Father. When we sing to you. It’s a way of giving thanks to you, Lord. We want to give that thanks to you, our heavenly Father, in Jesus name we pray. Amen. The stand together and close your time with a song.