Fellow-Redeemed,
We all want security. It does not always come. Those soldiers who died or were injured at Ft. Hood last week thought they were secure on the base. Many older people thought they were secure for retirement until the economy went south a few years ago. So many children feel safe and secure with mom and dad only to learn their parents are getting a divorce.
Security in this life can be illusive. What about security for eternity? Some avoid the issue by buying into the lie that when you die you cease to exist. Others struggle mightily every day with their fears about dying, what we might call the ultimate insecurity. Then there are those who are secure in the knowledge that one day they will rest from their labors and be with their Savior forever in heaven.
I pray that you are in that last group. As a believer in Christ, you know that you are secure both for this life and the next. The Holy Spirit testifies to our spirits. He gives that testimony in the Word of Christ, the promise of Jesus’ cross and empty tomb.
God the Holy Spirit through the Word of Christ endows us with Real Security for This Life and the Next. The Holy Spirit convinces us that we are God’s children. The Holy Spirit convinces us that we all are heirs of glory.
The apostles’ progression of thought goes this way. The Holy Spirit and the Father raised Jesus Christ’s dead body from the tomb. God has given us the same Holy Spirit who will one day raise our dead bodies to new life. The Spirit lives in believers’ hearts. This gives us new spiritual life.
In that life by the Spirit, we recognize and rejoice over our “obligation” now to walk in the Spirit’s ways rather than under the whip of our Old Adam. We gladly and willingly carry out this obligation because we are the sons and daughters of our Heavenly Father. God adopted us into his family through Holy Baptism. We know that to do otherwise means death because no child of God lives according to the sinful nature. “Because those who are led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God.”
There are times when I may begin to wonder if I am a child of God because I can’t shake my pet sins. I may feel my faith begin to waver under the heavy cross of my Father’s loving discipline, which never is pleasant at the time. My security in the One who is my Rock and my Fortress, my Deliverer may begin to evaporate like the mist from a spray bottle in the wind.
What to do? Better, what not to do? This is not the time to look my efforts to be better that fail. This is not the time to have faith in my faith. This is not the time to listen to the condemnation of the Old Man’s voice. Now is the time to listen to the Holy Spirit who lives in our hearts. “The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are the children of God.”
This testimony of the Spirit with our spirits is not an inner voice but the voice of revelation in the gospel of Jesus Christ. This testimony comes from the Word of God and the sacraments. It is the testimony of the absolution of our sins we hear in the liturgy, “God our heavenly Father, has forgiven all your sins. By the perfect life and innocent death of our Lord Jesus Christ, he has removed your guilt forever. You are his own dear child.”
The absolution does not give us the spirit of slavery that fears the master and lives for him only to avoid punishment. In that case, security comes only through my efforts. That leaves me constantly insecure. The Spirit’s testimony gives us security for this life in the midst of sin and doubt and fear.
We receive the Spirit of sonship. The Holy Spirit convinces us that we are God’s children. I do not have to try to convince myself. That is real security in the gospel in Word and sacrament that Jesus Christ paid for all my sins on his cross. God has forgiven me. We all carry away this security for life from the Lord’s Supper. The Spirit has strengthened and preserved us in true faith so that we go back to the spiritual battles of our daily lives “in peace.”
We add to those words of the blessing “to eternal life.” The Holy Spirit also convinces us that we are heirs of glory.
When Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane, he called out in trust to his Father. We have both the Hebrew word, Abba, and the English word Father both there and here. Like our Brother, we call the holy God our Father. We do so by the Spirit who testifies with our spirit that we are the children of God. We know that because of that new relationship in Christ we also are “heirs of God and co heirs with Christ.
The Holy Spirit convinces us that we all are heirs of glory. Everything Jesus inherited as true Man and returned to as true God awaits us at the end of our lives. We will share the entire honor, all the glory, all the holiness, the same position at the Father’s right hand as Jesus has. The only thing we will not share with him is his divine nature. We will not become gods or like gods in heaven.
The Holy Spirit testifies with our spirit that this is true through the Word of Christ. This gospel adopted us into God’s family to make us equal heirs with Christ, “co-heirs” with Christ. Whether a child is biological or adopted, parents love them all the same and promise them equal inheritance. This is the love God the Father has for his only begotten eternal Son and for us his children as Paul wrote to the Galatians, “You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.”
See the connection between the first and last verses of Paul’s words? One day God will raise up our death oriented bodies as he raised Christ’s body. By the Spirit, the Father has given us that spirit of sonship not fear even as we are co-heirs of Christ’s suffering now as his brothers and sisters. Then, when that resurrection takes place, we will hear our Father say, “Come, you who are blessed by my Father, take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you before the creation of the world.” [Matthew 25:34}
Amidst all the uncertainties we face daily, the Holy Spirit gives this real security for this life and the next. Amen. <SDG>