Experiential Religion
2 sermons on this topic
Returning to the cardinal blessings after a two-month digression, Pastor Martin moves from the legal to the experiential privileges of adoption and expounds the first and chief one: the gift of the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of adoption. Working through Galatians 4:4-6 and Romans 8:12-26, he shows that Christ was sent precisely to secure sonship, that the Spirit is freely given to every adopted child, and that the Spirit's primary work in adoption is to impart a filial disposition expressed in the cry 'Abba, Father.' He guards the witness of the Spirit from both dead orthodoxy and fanatical subjectivism, insisting it is never independent of the Word and the other fruits of the Spirit.
Pastor Martin expounds the second experiential privilege of adoption — the reality and certainty of God's paternal discipline — from Hebrews 12:1-13. He sets out three principles: the Father's love for his true children constrains him to discipline them (making the mathematical equation Father's love + adoption = discipline), God's discipline aims specifically at conforming us to the family likeness of holiness, and the proper response is to expect, understand, and submit to it. He closes with a sustained exhortation on the goodness of loving parental discipline both in the home and from God's hand.