Saved from Wrath by the Spirit of Adoption
June 3, 2009
“Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. (Romans 5:9)”
“For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. (Romans 8:15)”
The magnitude of Adam’s fall from the glory of God is absolutely unspeakable. Created a son of God according to Luke chapter 3, and verse 38, the children of Adam are now born into wrath, estranged from God (Psalm 58:3), bound by a spirit and nature that separates them from God, and man stands in need of a magnanimous grace of God that would adopt him back into the family of God, and make him a child of God once again. Scripture classifies the unsaved as “the offspring of God” in Acts 17:28, and 29, but stops short of calling him a child of God, reserving that term for the saved. Our sinful predisposition was powerful enough to strip us from the ability to call God our Father; in fact, in the words of Jesus Christ, “Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do (John 8:44).” First Corinthians 12:3 states “that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost.” So only by a spiritual transplant may man regain the distinction that Adam lost, that is, sonship with God. Our problem is spiritual, and thus it follows that our solution is also spiritual. For this cause, inspiration sets forth that “if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his (Romans 8:9).”
Both the urgency for salvation and the value of salvation has been tragically diminished in the minds of men today because he has failed to diagnose the status God-ward of the unregenerated. Christ died for our sins, a fact as splendid and profound as it is simple and pure. Yet the phrase is so commonly used that its genuine meaning has been trampled upon and lost: “For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead: And that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again.” 2 Corinthians 5:14, 15. Then were we all dead and appointed to wrath, but God has commended his love toward us, and we are saved from wrath through him. It is ironic that those who focus on God’s love so vehemently that they deny his wrath have a far more shallow vision of his love than those who appreciate his wrath. 2 Peter 2:4 reads, “God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment.” But “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16. The message of the cross becomes a more piercing and joyous reality to those who accept the divine wrath brought about by the sins of man.
Let the redeemed forget not what they are saved from. We are saved from wrath! In that grace says we “should not perish”, our state before grace said that we should perish. “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Romans 6:23. Our pre-salvation state is emphasized in John 3:36, “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.” So the wrath of God is the beginning state of man, because the nature of sin is the rule of his lifestyle until it is interrupted by the Spirit of God. The wrath of God that endures toward the angels that sinned endures also toward men that sinned, unless it is cancelled by the Spirit of God and the corresponding adoption into the family of God.
It is only the Spirit of God that can change our state and reverse our eternal destiny. “Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son.” Colossians 1:12, 13. Our fleshly nature is “the spirit of bondage” that causes us to fear, according to Romans 8:15. But “there is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit (Romans 8:1).” Fear and condemnation are companion elements of the bondage to sin that human nature has given us. But “the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made us free from the law of sin and death (Romans 8:2).” The Spirit of God breaks the bondage of sin out of our lives. Of course the cold, heart-hardened sinner would deny that he is a slave to the behaviors he exhibits, and would deny that he is living in fear. But the awareness of general ethics, virtues and moralities, even in the most unchurched among us all “shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another (Romans 2:15).” God has given every man a conscience, which is the voice of his soul, that eternal element of man which answers to his creation in the image of God and dictates his eventual and inevitable accountability to God. His conscience either accuses him or excuses at every turn. Every heart will not acknowledge the uneasiness caused him by the known perils of the soul, but this does not mean that anxiety is not ever present within him.
It behooves man to hearken unto the voice of God that speaks from his soul through the conscience in his innermost being. Grace uses the elements of conscience to register God’s appeal to fallen humanity. His love begs to snatch us from the snares of sin that his abiding wrath may be assuaged. While his pleading from the cross speaks of the blood that prevails against Satan’s devices, deliverance is only received when we cooperate with his appeal. The Word of God has given us the divine recipe for freedom from sin and adoption by God, “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.” Acts 2:38. Oh man, dear woman, reach out for that Holy Spirit that regathers mankind to his lost home, failing not to allow the words of truth to prick our ailing hearts: “They which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God.” Romans 9:8. “In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.” 1 John 3:10. “While it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation.” Hebrews 3:15. Consent unto the operation of God today, that this may be the day that your souls say, Abba, Father.
