“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,” Romans 8:15-16 (ESV)
We understand pretty well how fear can envelope our lives and we end up enslaved by it. For many people, such fear is debilitating and while they deny and ignore it, they remain trapped by things they are afraid of through superstitions, false teaching, or even misunderstandings of what is truth. We are taught however, in our Bible, that when we accept Jesus as our Savior we become children of God. Our promise today is that when we chose to believe and receive Jesus's free gift of new life, we also received the Spirit of adoption as sons and daughters in the Family of God. We respond in a most natural way for a child to respond to its Father, We cry out “Abba! Father!” This is the familiar way we call out to our earthly fathers by saying “Daddy! Poppa!” Yes, we can call on God in this endearing and familial way because we are in the Family. No more fear to enslave us, but the Holy Spirit dwelling in us, confirms us as children of the Most High God. Beyond our understanding now but not beyond our ability to believe the promise and receive the blessed adoption He has for us.
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