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Brothers and sisters, we are not debtors
to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the
flesh, you will die, but if by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the
body, you will live.
For
those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive a spirit of slavery
to fall back into fear, but you received a spirit of adoption, through which we
cry, “Abba, Father!” The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit
that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and
joint heirs with Christ, if only we suffer with him so that we may also be
glorified with him.
God arises; his enemies are scattered, and
those who hate him flee before him. But the
just rejoice and exult before God; they are glad and rejoice.
The
father of orphans and the defender of widows is God in his holy dwelling. God gives a home to the forsaken; he
leads forth prisoners to prosperity.
Blessed day by day be the Lord, who bears our burdens; God, who is our salvation. God is a saving God for us; the LORD,
my Lord, controls the passageways of death.
Your word, O Lord, is truth; consecrate us
in the truth.
Jesus was teaching in a synagogue on the
sabbath. And a woman was there who for eighteen years had been crippled by a
spirit; she was bent over, completely incapable of standing erect. When Jesus
saw her, he called to her and said, “Woman, you are set free of your
infirmity.” He laid his hands on her, and she at once stood up straight and
glorified God. But the leader of the synagogue, indignant that Jesus had cured
on the sabbath, said to the crowd in reply, “There are six days when work should
be done. Come on those days to be cured, not on the sabbath day.”
The Lord said to him in reply,
“Hypocrites! Does not each one of you on the sabbath untie his ox or his ass
from the manger and lead it out for watering? This
daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has bound for eighteen years now, ought she not
to have been set free on the sabbath day from this bondage?”
When he said this, all his adversaries
were humiliated; and the whole crowd rejoiced at all the splendid deeds done by
him.
1. God is inherently
good. He wants to set us free from bondage and adopt each one of us as his
child. He ministers to the vulnerable (widows, orphans, the forsaken,
prisoners). He is so good that He causes those who live in close relationship
with Him to “rejoice and exult before” Him, even though they experience
difficulties in this world. He will help us bear our burdens.
2. We simply need
to come to Him to access His goodness, to “cry, ‘Abba, Father!’” He will
receive us as a loving father receives his child, even if we have really messed
up. See Luke
15 especially verses 11 through 24; Isaiah
55 especially verses 6 through 11.
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