Access Unto The Father

Introduction: The Proof of Peace in Access to the Father

0:04 Will you follow, please, in your own Bible, as I read from Ephesians chapter 2, Ephesians chapter 2, verses 11 through 18. The Apostle Paul, who never grew weary of expressing his amazement at the salvation that God extended to needy and guilty sinners in Jesus Christ, is expressing another dimension of that amazement in this paragraph, in which he contrasts the relative position of Jew and Gentile prior to the coming of the gospel. And now the great privileges that both Jew and Gentile have has constituted the one church of Jesus Christ. Verse 11.

1:02 Behold uncircumcision by that which is called circumcision in the flesh, made by hands, that ye were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope, and without God in the world. But now, in Christ Jesus, ye that once were far off are made nigh in the blood of Christ, for he is our peace, who made both one, and break down the middle wall of partition, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances, that he might create in himself of the two one new man, so making peace, and might reconcile them both in one body unto God through the cross, having slain the enmity thereby. And he came and preached peace to you that were far off, and peace to you that were nigh. For through him we both have our access in one spirit unto the Father. In this particular portion of the word of God, as you have been reminded week by week,

2:30 we have the second great contrast of chapter 2. And in the opening up of this contrast between what the Gentiles were prior to the coming of the gospel and what they now are by the grace of God, the apostle, having described their native condition in verses 11 and 12, gives a summary statement of what their new condition is by the grace of God in verse 13, and then he gives, as it were, the fundamental principle of the whole thrust, of what he is saying in the first words of verse 14, for he is our peace, that is Christ. And then from 14 to 16 he expounds the manner in which this peace was procured for us. And so verses 14 to 16 are a description of the procurement of peace through the blood of the cross, peace between Jew and Gentile, peace between Jew and Gentile, and God. Verse 17 then is the record of the pronouncement or the announcement of that peace. Christ is our peace, not only in that he procures peace, but verse 17 says the very Christ who procured the peace is the Christ who announced the peace.

3:56 And literally, having come, he preached as good news, peace to you that were afar off, and peace to them. And then as though someone says, Paul, this is all wonderful for you to talk about this business of peace between Jew and Gentile, peace between Jew and Gentile and God, but what living proof is there that this is so? Well, that's the answer, or verse 18 is the answer to that question. For verse 18 comes to us as a proof that peace has been both procured and pronounced, and actually received by Jews and Gentiles.

4:39 And the proof is that there are Jews and Gentiles who, by the animation of the one Spirit, through the mediation of the one mediator Christ, are actually enjoying access unto the one God who is revealed as Father. And so last Lord's Day I attempted at least to begin to open up verse 18, verse 18, we looked at the text in its setting, and in its setting, in its connection of thought, it is a simple but wonderful statement of the proof of the reality of the peace that Paul is talking about. There at Ephesus, and we focused it all upon Simon and Demetrius, these specimen men, and the very fact that Simon and Demetrius, Simon with his Jewish background, Demetrius with his pagan Roman, or Greek background, are both enjoying individual access to God through Christ in the Spirit, and they gather together in the same assembly enjoying access, and Paul says in essence, there is no explanation for this phenomena of both Jew and Greek coming to God in the full liberty of sonship, and coming in the one Spirit through the one mediator, there is no explanation,

The Nature and Necessities of Biblical Salvation

6:04 but that which is expounded in verses 14 through 17, Christ has procured peace by the blood of this cross, Christ has come through his representatives, and has announced that peace. But then this text has tremendous weight in itself, without having to sustain the emphasis of the context, it's one of those great mountain peaks of divine statement, and so we've been, considering not only the meaning of the text in its setting, but the message of the text in itself. And I suggested last week two things, and I'll mention them, and then we proceed to the third this morning. This text contains a profound word concerning the nature of biblical salvation. As Paul describes the salvation procured by Christ, and announced by Christ, he describes it as a salvation that is decidedly, and pervasively, Trinitarian to the core. It is through Christ, in the Spirit, that access is enjoyed to the Father. And then, secondly, this text contains a word concerning not only the nature of biblical salvation, but the necessities of biblical salvation.

7:25 And those necessities are too in the text. There is the necessity of the mediation of the Son. It is through Him, and Him alone, that we have access to the Father. And it is in the one Spirit that is enveloped, surrounded, animated, permeated with the Spirit, that we enjoy access to the Father.

The Highest Privilege: Access to God as Father

7:48 So there is no biblical salvation divorced from the mediation of the Son, and the ministration of the Holy Spirit. So much for that brief overview of what we've covered thus far. In the setting of this passage, or seeing this passage in its setting now this morning, we come to the third message, or line of message in the text itself, and it is this. This text sets before us not only the nature of biblical salvation, the necessities of biblical salvation, but the highest privilege of biblical salvation.

8:31 When Paul would describe the privileges procured by Jesus, by Jesus Christ for Jew and Gentile, when he would describe it in its highest, its most elevated reaches, what is it that he sets before them as the essence of that privilege? Is it peace with God and one another? The cessation of hostility and enmity? Well, according to Romans 5.1, that's no little part of our salvation. Having therefore been justified, by faith we have peace with God. The turning away of divine wrath and displeasure. There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.

9:17 Great privilege. Is it the joy of the knowledge of sins forgiven? The consciousness of that future bliss that is ours, described in chapter 1, verses 13 and 14? No.

9:31 Though no one who is acquainted with his Bible would ever say that peace is not a privilege, peace with God, the subjective enjoyment of that peace, the knowledge of sins forgiven, the privilege and certainty of knowing what the future holds, no one who is biblically intelligent at all would deny that these are great and glorious fruits of the salvation purchased by Christ and applied by the Spirit. But when the apostle would show the highest privilege of biblical salvation, he does so in these words, for through him, that is, through Christ, we both have our access in one spirit unto or towards or in the direction of the Father.

The Identity of the Father: The God of Glory and Sovereignty

10:23 In other words, the apostle sets before us as the highest privilege of biblical salvation this truth that access to God as Father is the great reality secured by the mediation of the Son and the ministration of the Holy Spirit. And it's my purpose this morning to make a stab, to make an effort to open up something of the glory of this privilege. And we shall do so along the following lines. First of all, we must consider the identity of the one who is called Father in this text. And then secondly, our native or previous relationship to this one who is called Father. And thirdly, the present privileges involved in this relationship to God as Father. First of all, then, the identity of the one who is called Father.

11:26 Look at the text. For through him we both have our access in one spirit unto the Father. Now, when the Apostle wrote the words the Father, to whom was he referring? Was he speaking of the Heavenly Father of modern theology?

11:51 The great round glob of unprincipled sentiment and slushy affection who, like the proverbial three monkeys, sees no evil, hears no evil, speaks no evil, and certainly would do nothing, unkind under any circumstances whatsoever. That's the connotation of these words to many people. When you say the Father, they think of that formless, unprincipled glob of slushy affection who would harm no one and would do good where he can and where he's not frustrated by man. And that's the concept of the Father.

12:34 Was he referring to that great, benevolent benefactor who stretches, snatches out large arms to embrace all of his creatures within the orbit of his own special love and affection? No, no. If you want to know the identity of the Father in verse 18, all you do is go right back through this epistle and see where God is referred to as Father and you understand precisely who the Apostle had in mind. And the first reference to him as the Father is in chapter 2, chapter 1, in verse 3.

13:10 In this great hymn of praise to the triune God for the great salvation that is ours in Christ, the Apostle says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ even as he hath chosen us in him. And then he goes on to describe the activity of the Holy Spirit of this Father in the salvation of sinners. Then he picks up the name Father again in the second paragraph of the first chapter in his prayer. And he says that he continues to give thanks to God for the saints, verse 16. And now he begins to expound concerning his petition, verse 17, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you. So the identity of the Father in chapter 2 and verse 18 is to be understood in the light of the previous references to him as the Father within this very epistle. It is unthinkable that the Apostle would conceive of the Father in one light in chapter 1 when there were no chapters and then, as it were, completely reverse the whole perspective.

14:38 So when he says that the highest privilege of biblical salvation is access to God as Father, he is speaking of the Father as the God who is revealed in the perspectives of chapter 1. He is the Father essentially and primarily in the glory of the inter-Trinitarian relationship of the Godhead. Notice, he's the God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the Father of glory.

15:19 That is, the Father characterized by the outshining of all the perfections of the Godhead. That's what glory is. It's the outshining of the perfections of God. And so into this little word, Father, we are to press, we are to press, all of the glorious things said of Him in those previous chapters.

15:45 The God of unbounded sovereignty. The God of eternal purpose and plan. The God of unfettered freedom who works all things after the counsel of His own will. The God of glory before whom even those sinless creatures veil feet and face and cry one to another.

16:09 Holy, holy, holy. The God who was Father from eternity in that delightful relationship of the persons of the triune Godhead. Utterly complete in Himself. Not frustrated.

16:25 Not yearning to have communion with some creature and therefore, as it were, twisting His own arm to make men and angels and other rational beings who could commune with Him. No, no, no. He's the Father of the Lord. The Lord Jesus Christ.

16:41 And Jesus says in John 17, Father, Thou lovest Me before the foundation of the world. The Father had all the delight of His heart complete in that face-to-face relationship with the eternal Word. He is essentially Father in the inter-trinitarian relationship between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And then when He deals with His creatures, He's the God who does not cease to be the self-sufficient, unbounded Sovereign of the universe.

17:19 And this is precisely how the Apostle describes Him in His saving activity in chapter 1. Therefore, when it is said that the highest privilege of biblical salvation based upon the mediation of the Son and the ministration of the Spirit is access to the Father, we are not to diminish any of the glory of all that is in Himself simply because He now begins to sustain a relationship to us as Father. The word Father with reference to sinful creatures is a word of relationship.

18:06 In the mystery of the Trinity, He is Father from eternity. And there are things that we cannot penetrate. We can only pull back, as it were, the edges of the veil and peek for a moment and turn away, lost in the blazing wonder of what we see. In relationship to the Son, He is eternally the Father.

18:28 The term Father, in some sense, must speak of His essence. But with relationship to you and me, Father is always a term of relationship.

18:39 And long before He became Father in relationship to men, Father of Adam by creation, Father of His elect in redemption, everything that He was as God, He is eternally. And the fact that He becomes Father does not diminish one dimension of all that He is as the Father of glory. Now do you see why I felt such a sense of conscious weakness even trying to preach on such a lofty, think of the Lord Jesus. All that He was eternally as the eternal Word.

19:21 He did not cease to be when He became man. As you've heard frequently in this pulpit, He did not cease to be what He always was. He began to be what He never had been. But He did not cease to be what He eternally was.

Our Native Relationship to the Father: Children of Wrath

19:40 And so with the Father, all that He is, in the essential glory of His Godhead, He maintains the full integrity of all of that, undiminished in its glory, when He becomes Father to rebel sinners. And if we're to catch something of the glory of what's embodied in this text, we must have clearly in our minds the identity of the One called Father. But then further, we must have some understanding of the previous or native relationship sustained to the One called Father. Again, if you see there is no access to God as Father apart from the mediation of the Son and the ministration of the Spirit, this is an eloquent testimony to the fact that God is not the Father of all His creatures simply because they are His creatures. If it takes the mediation of the Son and the ministry of the Spirit by means of proclamation rooted in the procuration and the procurement of Christ, reasoning back from verse 17 to 14 to 16, then the Apostle is telling us apart from these things, He is not the Father of any of His rational creatures. And we must understand that. We must understand something of our native or previous relationship to this God who has now become Father

21:06 to His own people. In the Garden of Eden, there was a sense in which it is proper to say Adam, was the Son of God. He is called that in Luke 3, 38. I'm aware that the word Son is not in the original, but the whole drift of the genealogy warrants the insertion of the word Adam, Son of God.

21:30 All of the majesty, the glory, the love, and compassion of the Godhead flowed towards Adam in a disposition of loving, intimate, fatherly delight. Think what it must have meant. God beheld all the things and all that He made and it was very good. Adam was the Son of God.

21:52 God was His Father. The God who spoke worlds into being out of the womb of nothing. The God who takes a little handful of dust and makes a man and takes a rib and makes a woman and breathes into them the breath of life and constitutes them living soul in the mystery of human personality placed in the mystery of the universe that involves the expanses of galaxies that great God is Father to Adam entering into all that delights His child. His child having no higher desire than to please His Father.

22:30 Yet the tragic account of Genesis 3 is that this lasted probably for a very short time. Sin entered and what happened? Well, God didn't cease to be God. Man did not cease to be man.

22:44 There was no essential change in God. He cannot change. There was an intrusion into man of something there had never been before. There was a pollution of His entire nature.

22:55 But you see, the relationship has changed. God is still God and man is still man, but man is no longer the child of God. God is no longer His Father. The relationship of filial love and delight and complacency is gone.

23:12 Now there is mutual alienation. God turns away from the creature because He is of pure nature. To arise and to look upon iniquity. And the creature turns away from God in the enmity of His fallen nature.

23:24 There is aversion. There is distance. And so according to this very epistle, all men by nature sustain a relationship to God not of loving fatherly favor, but chapter 2 and verse 3 says, we were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. The relationship we sustain to this great God who was God, who was our father in Adam, but who is now against us because of our sin, is a relationship of liability to divine wrath.

23:58 Instead of all the wisdom and omnipotence and all of the glorious attributes of God as it were committed to our well-being, they are committed to our destruction. Because God must uphold the honor of His throne and the dignity of His own being. We are children of wrath, chapter 2 and verse 12 says, without God and without hope. Chapter 4 verse 18, alienated from the life of God.

24:32 Now do you see something of the wonder of what is described in this text?

The Cost of Access: Incarnation, Gethsemane, and Golgotha

24:39 If the highest privilege of biblical salvation is access to God His Father, I will not begin to appreciate that privilege. Until I see something of what my native relationship to this God was. What my previous or native relationship to Him was because of sin before the application of the mediation of Christ and the quickening of the Holy Spirit. So high were the obstacles that before any sinner, Jew or Gentile, could ever have access to God.

25:19 What had to happen? There had to be the baffling mystery of the incarnation. If our access is through Him and in the context it's through Him crucified, through Him in the blood of His cross, through Him in His flesh, that is His death. Well He had to have a true humanity in which to die.

25:44 You mean God is so inaccessible in Himself because of our sin that not even God can access us? That nothing but the profound mystery of the incarnation will begin to resolve the problem? Precisely, my friend. Anyone who thinks, well it's a simple thing for God to take His erring creatures and simply welcome them back into His loving arms, explain the manger.

26:10 Explain the manger. When eternal God comes to a stinking cow's head,

26:20 explain the virgin's womb. When unpound, the deity is compressed in the confines of the womb of a little peasant girl without ceasing to be all that He is as God.

26:38 You explain that mystery. What's the rationale for it? What is there behind all of this? God is saying the barriers to my having creatures who will have access to me as Father.

26:53 The barriers are so high,

26:57 so deep, the ales, that nothing can stop me. Nothing short of the mystery of the incarnation can begin to resolve it.

27:11 Nothing short of the staggering realities of Gethsemane and Golgotha. When Paul says that it's in the blood of His cross that access has been procured to God, when it is by His death, He's bringing us into the orbit of what can be called nothing less than the staggering realities of Gethsemane and Golgotha. The bloody sweat, the agony of that conflict between true and sinless humanity, fearing death, cringing from it. My own heart was profoundly moved this week in meditating upon those words.

27:52 Not my will, but Thine. Think of the mystery of that.

27:57 Christ, in that sense, had an independent human will, which facing the agonies of rejection and the awful misery of abandonment by the Father, recoiled, He said, My will is to bypass the cross.

28:16 Yet My will is to embrace the cross.

28:20 Not My will, but Thine be done.

28:25 You explain those mysteries, will you?

28:29 God's not playing games. If any person is to have access to the Father,

28:37 the struggles of Gethsemane must be a reality. The staggering realities and mysteries of Golgotha, when toward the ninth hour he cries with that cry that eternity will not expound even with God as the commentator. My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?

29:00 The amazing triumphs of the open tomb, the open skies, the poured out spirit, tongues of fire. What's the meaning of all of this? Look at our text. Through one spirit access to the Father, my friends, so great were the problems connected with bringing sinners such as you and I, such as you and me, back into relationship to this God.

29:29 Nothing short of these realities would suffice.

Present Privileges of Access: Confidence in Acceptance, Love, and Purpose

29:35 You'll never appreciate this great privilege of biblical salvation till you understand something of your native relationship to the God who is Father. But then, in the third place, consider with me the presence of God. The present privileges of this access to God as Father. We've looked at the identity of the One to whom we come, the great distant land out of which we had to be brought, and now what are the privileges of this access?

30:06 I remind you, as we underscored last week, He uses a present verb. Through Him we are continually having access, having this introduction in the one spirit unto God. Through the Father. Is it too much to say that this access to God as Father and the conscious enjoyment of that relationship is the height of redemptive privilege?

30:35 I believe the Scriptures warrant such a statement. Turn to the book of Galatians for a moment.

30:42 Chapter 3.

30:45 The book of Galatians, chapter 3.

30:55 Speaking of the work of Christ in verse 13, Christ hath redeemed us from the curse, of the law, having become a curse for us, for it is written, Cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree, that,

31:10 here you have a clause of purpose, why did Christ become a curse for us?

31:17 That upon the Gentiles might come the blessing of Abraham in Christ Jesus, and what is that blessing? That we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. Christ died, in order to form the just basis upon which God could minister the Spirit. You see, the mediation of Christ, the ministry of the Spirit.

31:44 And what is the height of the Spirit's ministry to those who are redeemed by the curse-bearing of Christ and become recipients of the Spirit? Chapter 4 and verse 6.

32:01 And because ye are sons, God sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, that is, Father, so that thou art no longer a bondservant, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God. You get the line of thought in the Apostle's mind? There were the just demands of God's holy law, and in so rightful communion with His creatures, and Christ undertakes to bear the curse for us, that by His obedience and His death to the Spirit for all on whose behalf He died. And having been exalted, He has sent forth the Spirit. And when the Spirit comes, His crowning work is to do what? To attest the enjoyment.

33:05 Isn't that what He says? Send forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts to give us the consciousness and the enjoyment and the liberty of this access.

33:20 And what are some of the privileges of that access? Let me suggest just three that I think encompass most of the others. This could be a whole series of messages, but I'm simply attempting to expound with some application Ephesians 2.18.

33:37 What are the present privileges of this access? Well, the first is this. Confidence in His unreserved acceptance.

33:47 Confidence in the unreserved acceptance of the God who is God. His Father. Think of it. You and I provoked Him in Adam.

33:59 In Adam all and the Father regards as in Adam. We stood in our federal head and we sinned in Him according to Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15. And then in time when we were brought to birth, we provoked Him going astray from the womb speaking lies. All of the hours and days and years of selfishness and impenitence indifference to His law and to His gospel trampling underfoot the blood of His Son.

34:33 How in the world can we ever hope to have the unreserved acceptance of such a God? Provoking Him with our sins. Wearing Him with our impenitence and our unbelief. Thinking ill of Him.

34:48 Believing the lie of the devil that God is mean.

34:54 Nothing but the mediation of Christ can form the basis of this acceptance. And no one but the Spirit can ever reveal that basis of acceptance. It's too good to be true that through something done by another point in history and presently done by one whom I cannot see with physical eyes who is somewhere in the universe of God I know not where and to the Father for me to all of those wrong dispositions to God and to have liberty of access through mysteries that cannot be asked by flesh and blood you see it is the work of the mediator and the ministry of the Spirit by which alone we are enabled to have confidence in the unreserved acceptance of God but oh my friend listen if you've cast yourself upon Christ and He is your only plea in the presence of God it is a shameful thing to doubt His unreserved acceptance. He died first Peter 3.18 to bring us to God. Hebrews 10.19 says

36:13 by Him let us with bold but you say God is so holy ah He is God is so majestic He is with blazing light of holiness and spotless purity but you have access through Christ and I could not help but think of the days of the Kennedy administration and this in no way is either an oblique or an overt approval of the man or the administration I'm simply illustrating and here were dignitaries who if they wanted access to the oval room into the working office of the president oh they had to go through all kinds of protocol and security checks and the rest and they said it was very humorous at times in the midst of some profound meeting debating and discussing matters of international policy one of the doors would open and in would trot a little curly haired kid with a little toy in his hand and go right up to the man who sat behind the oval desk or the desk in the oval room it didn't bother him about security checks and protocol and all the rest why? he said the man behind that desk is my daddy he's my daddy and believing him

37:42 to be my daddy I know what I'll have whenever I come into his presence undeserved acceptance he hath sent forth the spirit of his son into our hearts crying father father now how do we how do you think Mr. Kennedy would have felt if little John John stood over in the corner afraid that an FBI agent might pounce on him huh?

38:12 why you say he'd have been grieved as a father and how does the living God feel if I may not be irreverent in asking the question when having brought his son into the world in the mystery of the incarnation having brought him through all the abandonment of Gethsemane and Golgotha and the triumphs of the open tomb in the party sent his spirit on with unreserved as the father feel when you cringe over in the corner venture on him venture home let no other trust intrude just as surely as men dishonor God by a carnal presumption that struts up to him as though he were not holy as though he were not infinitely just just as God is insulted when men bypass the mediation of Christ bypass the necessity of the work of the spirit and think they can have access to God on the basis of their own performance so God is grieved and insulted when those who throw themselves upon the mediation of his son who in poverty of the spirit acknowledge they are nothing and have nothing and can do nothing and stand in utter dependence

39:40 upon the ministry of the spirit God is grieved by the unbelief that causes such to linger and shudder and shrivel and shake in the shadows instead of drawing near with boldness of access through him in the one spirit we have access unto the father that involves confidence in his unreserved acceptance secondly it involves confidence in his unchanging love and affection as God in himself he is unchanging I the Lord change not therefore when he enters into a covenant relationship with his people he is now related to them as father with unchanging love that's why in that very text Malachi 3 6 we do not have a statement in isolation of the immutability of God a convenient proof text for the theologies to have and for the theologians to use he says I the Lord change not therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed because God changes not there is unchanging love and affection love that makes our person his concern

41:08 Psalm 103 like as a father pitieth his children so the Lord pitieth them that fear him he knoweth our frame not just our frame generically that is in general he knows his creatures in general no no Psalm 139 reveals that it's much more intimate than that O Lord thou hast searched me and known me and to David that was not some heavenly inquisitor going around with a checkbook he says such thoughts are too wonderful for me he's lost in the glory of it concerned with him he's not threatened by it he's filled with the wonder of it such knowledge is too high for me it is wonderful I cannot attain because unchanging love is concerned with the details of its objects a wife who says she loves her husband and is not concerned with the broken buttons on his shirt and with the special ways he likes his meatloaf poor husband begins to question her love if it doesn't find expression in detailed individual expressions so it is with our father he knoweth our frame and as we come to some understanding of what it is to have this privilege of access to the father

42:37 we must grow in our confidence in the unchanging nature of that love love that makes our person in all of its details his concern love that makes our good his concern and that the whole message of Hebrews 12 concerning his chastisement whom he loves he chastens why that we might be partakers of his holiness love that makes our activities the object of his concern remember how the Lord taught this in Matthew 6 your father who seeth in secret shall reward you openly he says when you go into your closet to pray your father sees you in secret when you secretly reach into your pocket to give not to impress others but to give to your father in secret he sees when you deny yourself and fast for the sake of the gospel and to give yourself to prayer and no one knows you shave and you put oil upon your face as a good Easterner would do to look refreshed refreshed as though there were no fasting he says your father who sees in secret you see the emphasis in that sermon on the mount it bristles with the holy standard of God's law there is some of the most precious material on the intimacy of the father's concern with every activity of his children love that makes our persons his concern our good his concern our activities that makes our needs your heavenly father knoweth what things he has to do

44:06 to have need of why didn't he say God knows why does he say again and again your heavenly father knows may I throw out a little conjecture that I'm toying with in the gospel of John where we have more as far as actual substance of the recorded sermons and discourses of our Lord than in any of the other gospels it is interesting that the word father is found no fewer than approximately a hundred and twenty times in the gospel of John the word father God in general is found about seventy times why did the Lord Jesus continually refer to him as his father the father why could it be that something of the delight that he knew as the eternal son in that relationship to the God who he was and yet to the God to whom he was son the mystery of the trinity we cannot expound it and lay it out in a rational way could it be could it be that the Lord was seeking to impress upon his own people that that was the glory of the redemption he had come to effect that they might know something as creatures in relationship to God that would at least in some way begin to approach what he the son knew in relationship

45:35 to the father I don't know but I wonder if this isn't what he's emphasizing in the sermon of the mount your father not God but your father what things he have need of if he who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children how much more shall the what the heavenly father give good gifts to those who ask and so the present privilege is not only confidence in his unreserved acceptance confidence in his unchanging love but briefly and finally confidence in his immutable purpose and here's the glory of seeing you see that the father is God and God is the father therefore if the father is God in all of the full employ of everything that is peculiar to him is God who says I will work and who can hinder what confidence we his children ought to have in his immutable purpose for as father what is he designed to do he's designed to bring many sons all the way to glory that's what we read in Hebrews in bringing many sons not just out of sin for a time and along the road for a time until they peter out no no in bringing many sons sons he's bringing sons to glory

Instruction and Warning: Honor Christ, Depend on the Spirit, Beware of Deflection

47:03 Romans 8 29 whom he did foreknow he did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his son that he Christ might be but the firstborn among many brethren God is determined that his own son shall have a family that reflect the family likeness and also when I can begin to understand as a Christian that in the largeness of all that is fatherly affection towards me giving me this confidence of unreserved acceptance confidence of unchanging love that is concerned about my person my good my activities my needs to know that all of this is bound up with an unbreakable band and unchained purpose that will not rest until I am brought safely home to glory oh dear child of God what comfort it ought to be to know that these are my privileges they've been too dearly bought for you to live as though they were not yours they've been too dearly bought for you to live as a servant and Paul argues that way in Galatians now granted a servant is a member of the household the master of the house is not against him he's for him he provides for him but who can compare the position of a servant with a son the servant must go through proper protocol

48:32 the servant is always conscious of the distance but the son no now this does not mean we become irreverent and flippant with God no Peter says if you pass the time of your sojourning here if you call on the father without respect of persons judges every man according to his work pass the time of your sojourning in fear knowing you were not redeemed with corrupt granted there is filial awe yes there is the awe I'm in the presence of the God of the universe but it is not the spirit of bondage that brings crippling fear that hath torment for the apostle says we've not received the spirit again to fear but we've received the spirit of adoption whereby we cry Abba Father you see in the garden Satan came with two fundamental lies about God and he's been destroying people with those two fundamental lies ever since on the one hand he said God is not holy and just you can sin and get away with it you shall not surely die and secondly God is not the God of love and mercy that he's revealed himself to you no he's told you stay clear of that tree because he's really mean he doesn't want you to be like him God is not holy God is not love and with those two lies Satan destroys the souls of man and perhaps in this very room he's destroying some of you with one or two of those lies

50:02 you think you can come to God bypassing the cross God is not so holy as to demand that you come to him through the mediation of his son could it be that he's crippling some of you who are the children of God because he just cannot grasp the fact that you have access to the Father in Christ somehow God's got to hold grudges when I haven't behaved myself I've got to do evangelical penance which is going around joyless for at least a week before I dare to call him Father my friends as the children of God may we catch something of the glory of this highest privilege of biblical salvation may we catch the word of instruction inherent in it the extent to which we honor Christ as mediator and live in dependence upon the Spirit as animator and life giving power to that extent alone we'll enjoy liberty of access to the Father the text says it's through him that we are having not through him that we had as though you deal with Christ at the threshold and then you get beyond it no no we continue to enjoy access through him that's why the whole emphasis

51:30 of the book of Hebrews or much of the emphasis is on the present work of Christ securing present boldness and present access child of God would you enjoy access to the Father make much of Christ the mediator in his present office as mediator of his people make much of the Spirit in the sense that you come acknowledging your beggarliness apart from his quickening grace for the Spirit alone is at work and give light upon the face of Christ that we see him in his continual glory as a person as our intercessor we can as it were look and look at the right hand in vain with no ravishing sight of Christ that elicits confidence unless the Spirit is pleased continually to make him real to us and so be instructed child of God if you would enter in more and more to the privileges of your sonship make much of Christ as mediator and the Spirit as animator and there's a word of warning here whenever your experience begins to change to get out of the orbit of these fixed boundaries you better be suspicious of it if your religion begins to be Spirit centered beware of it if it begins to be just Jesus centered beware of it look at the text it's through Christ and in the Spirit that we have access

52:59 to the Father in other words it's the Father with whom we have primarily conscious communion and access in our dealings with Christ our will with Him as the one through whom we come to the Father child of God this text can save you from any heartache any religious emphasis that terminates upon the sweet Spirit and loses sight of the majesty and the glory of the Godhead revealed in the Father it may not be outright heresy but it's deflection from biblical norms in any religion that's all Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus beware of it beware of it it doesn't fit the pattern of this passage and then my final word is to you who sit here this morning and your heart's been dead as a dodo to everything that's been said oh listen listen this morning the God who is Father to those who are in Christ is the God who in the full unfettered possession of all that He is is God and I say it reverently I say it tenderly listen that God is against you

Call to Unbelievers: Flee God's Wrath Through Christ

54:28 the scripture says the wrath of God abideth on him that believeth not God is angry with the wicked every day and there are passages that almost almost seem beyond comprehension of the fierceness of that anger God uses such language in Psalm 50 that He's prepared His sword He's already whetted it and made it sharp He's already bent His bow and He's already His arrows of destruction are poised as it were in that very bow God says if He turn not He will come with destruction my friend listen you've got these notions that God is the Heavenly Father whose big arms of love are just open to everyone at all times regardless of what they do with His Son and with His Spirit oh may God dispel that lying notion from your mind and from your heart my friend listen you're under the canopy of divine wrath this very moment you're a child of wrath by nature and you'll remain such until you come to that God through Jesus Christ and in the Holy Spirit and if you have some silly notion that God is just loving Father take us all home to Heaven at last oh God have mercy upon you in that state of deception

55:57 and if you sink into Hell with that lie in your bosom these hands are clean of your blood until you come to the God of the universe whose anger you've provoked by your sin and seek mercy from Him through Jesus Christ alone and cry to that God that He would turn your swinish nature into a nature fit to be His habitation fit to dwell with Him forever you're undone in the language of this very text without hope and without God oh seek the Lord while He may be found call upon Him while He's near child of God what is your privilege the privilege of coming to God as Father as you gather to the Lord's table tonight may it be with renewed actings of love and appreciation as you gaze upon the Lord Jesus crucified who underwent all of the agony of that work that you might even this day bow your head and say from the heart in the joyous awareness of the Spirit's testifying to your sonship my Father my Father do you enjoy that access this morning do you do you know it in reality

57:25 in your own experience God grant that you shall let us pray oh God we confess again that the gospel is filled with such profoundness we feel ourselves unable in mind or in spirit to rise to the glory to the wonder the grandeur of these gospel mysteries and yet we thank you that many of us gathered in this place have been given eyes to see although we see through a glass darkly we thank you we are no longer blind but we see we thank you that we may call you Father not in the presumption of carnal confidence but because you've sent the Spirit into our hearts enabling us thus to cry Abba Father oh God our Heavenly Father be merciful to those who have no grounds to call you Father help those who have cast themselves upon your Son who have been given a new heart but who

58:54 because of poor teaching and because of the accusations of the enemy hesitate to come near with boldness and call you Father oh Holy Spirit help them through the word even this morning now we commend ourselves and this people to you asking that as we part from this place and from one another it may be in the awareness of your own presence and your dealings with our hearts continue to crown this day with your presence and with the blessing of your spirit upon our hearts to the end that your name may be praised we may be edified and sinners may be brought broken to the feet of Christ hear us oh God in this our plea we ask through our Lord Jesus Christ Amen