Adoption | Romans 8:1-17 | Andrew Banker

So my name is Andrew Banker, pastor of men's and missions here at C3.

And I have the uh honor and privilege to bring the message this morning.

Uh Colton, I believe, is on the beach somewhere enjoying the waves.

So uh we are here and enjoying Memphis July 6th weather.

It's wonderful.

Um so since our first Sunday visiting C3 almost two years ago, our tribe, as uh I just mentioned Tommy gave us that that name with all the kids, our tribe was so welcomed and accepted.

We have five crazy kids, and some Sundays we have some extras with us.

Uh our firstborn, Binaya, is nine.

The picture up.

Um, our secondborn, Walker, is five, and we started a form of foster care uh when Binaya, nine years old, was only a toddler.

We were with an organization called Safe Families for Children and hosted primarily, is it me leaning?

We're good.

Okay.

Uh primarily uh it was primarily for infants.

Um and so we hosted infants for about six, eight weeks at a time to help uh mom find stability with a job.

And it was incredible ministry uh that led us to the need to open our home uh with Tennessee Department of Child Services.

And uh if you hear us talk about foster care, we say DCS when we vent, and that's who we're talking about.

Um so we've had a series of kids come and go out of our home, and this lifestyle is definitely a calling uh we see God in.

A lot of times we are held in the fire and refined more than we would like.

Um, Savannah even has a tattoo of uh song lyrics from Refiner burn me beautiful, burn me lovely, burn me righteous, burn me holy.

And I think sometimes the reality of being refined is more uncomfortable than we would like.

Foster care will give you the highs and lows, and there's no greater testament to our amazing God than being thrown in the fire.

We've known our girls for about two and a half years.

Madison is 12, and her birthday is coming up.

Happy birthday, Madison, this week.

And uh Leah is six.

Um they're Honduran and the sweetest compliment to our family.

Um so about two years ago, we had uh it had been on our hearts to grow our family through being available doing what we're doing.

Um and so uh we uh tried to decipher that, what that meant for us doing adoption through foster care.

We even explored uh international adoption because as some of you know, uh we have the coffee company um and just fell in love with the Latin American culture.

And so um somehow Savannah had a Zoom call with the Mexican government about adoption, and they gave us a few agencies to reach out to, and we were getting to the point where we needed to apply and uh fill out and pay the deposit.

Um and something was just holding us back.

And uh uh on July 24th, two years ago, Savannah called me uh one morning after I left the house to work.

She said, Andrew, I'm tired of trying to lead this desire for expanding our family through adoption.

I want God to lead.

And so we prayed.

I was driving, you know, kept my eyes open, everything's safe.

Um, but about 30 minutes later, she called me again and said, uh, I just got a call for a 10-day-old baby needing a placement.

No known health concerns, um, baby boy, Guatemalan heritage.

Uh, and also the casework said it should be a cut and dry case.

And so that miracle uh became adopted March 11th, and that was March 11th, um, just a few months ago.

And so that's why uh I want to share Romans 8 with y'all this morning.

Um Romans 8, 1 through 17.

Read along with me.

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, for the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.

For God has done what the law weakened by the flesh could not do, by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin he condemned sin in the flesh.

In order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not accordingly to the flesh, but according to the spirit, for those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh.

Those who live according to the spirit set their minds on the things of the spirit.

For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the spirit of is life and peace.

For the mind that is set on flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law, indeed it cannot.

Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

You, however, are not in the flesh, but in the spirit.

If in fact the spirit of God dwells in you, any one who does not have the spirit of Christ does not belong to him.

But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life because of righteousness.

If the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies, through his spirit who dwells in you.

So then, brothers, we are debtors not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh, for if you live according to the flesh you will die.

But if you live but by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.

For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, Abba, Father.

The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.

And of children, then heirs, heirs of God, and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him, in order that we may also be glorified with him.

This is the word of the Lord.

Um, I was in a meeting not too long ago, and uh who I was meeting with also gets distracted very easily.

And so we started working on our the notes that we made, and we started at the bottom of the list.

And he's like, look at us, we're so distracted, we used to start at the bottom, but then that fit perfectly with the sermon.

So I'm starting at the bottom of where we ended.

Um and so where it says so then, the NIV translation says um uh therefore.

And so I want to discuss why, therefore, what it's there for.

Um we've got to we'll have to know that in context.

So working backwards, I want us to have three notes to remember.

We are adopted as sons and daughters, we change because of this, and we are given new life.

Um, so uh context, adoption in Rome.

When Paul writes this, he's writing to Rome for the book of Romans.

Uh, one of the most well-known cases of adoption is found in the figure of Caesar Augustus, uh, during whose reign Jesus was born.

Caesar Augustus, originally known as Octavian, was the grandnephew of Julius Caesar.

I had to look this up, I had no idea, and then it was so fascinating to me.

So stick with me.

I know this is all gonna sound uh like Roman Greek uh history.

So if you enjoy that, you'll enjoy this segment right here.

After attaining victory over the Roman general Pompey, Julius Caesar was able to secure his reign over Rome.

After Caesar's assassination, however, Octavian discovered in Julius Caesar's will that his granduncle had made him heir.

This was secured through the Posmosis act of adoption.

Octavian's father quelled a slave rebellion once led by Spartacus.

His mother was related to Julius Caesar, yet it was not his genetic lineage that gave him the right to rule Rome, but the legal act of adoption.

Augustus' adoption at 18 to 19 years of age gave him claim to wealth, military forces, and Roman imperial authority.

Though Cleopatra was well known for her love affair with Mark Antony, it was common knowledge then that Julius Caesar had a son with the Egyptian queen, yet the act of adoption superseded Caesar's own bloodline.

Hence the New Testament historian Robert Lewis states that there can be no higher claim than to have been adopted by the ruler of Rome.

And adoption continued to be used.

The Roman Emperor Nero, who church tradition tells us beheaded the Apostle Paul, came to power by adoption.

Adoption was well known through the empire.

So with that context, what Paul writes, it's not just to the wind.

This is something serious.

It was an honor to be adopted.

It was used to keep a bloodline name secure, bloodline name by securing a male heir and even established political alliances.

The adopted individual gained the new father's name, the family, legal status, including inheritance rights.

So adoption to sonship, when he says this, when Paul writes this letter to the Romans, they're familiar with this concept of adoption.

Just like what I experienced in front of a judge in a courtroom back in March.

The idea of adoption to sonship means God, our Father, is the one who gives us a new name.

We named our son Elias Maverick because it means the Lord is our God.

And he is set apart because of this.

A song that I've fallen in love with that's not translated to English yet.

So, Chris, I need you starting to do this for me.

It's called Vivo Akasa.

It's by Maverick City Muzka.

It says, I'm coming home.

The home of my father, and he calls me by name.

I go back home, I go back home to the house of my father who loves me and calls me.

You call me by my name, even though you know my past, even so you accept me, and I am your son.

And verse 14.

For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.

This Holy Spirit in us defines us in our Father's house.

My children, including the ones that we did not conceive, are defined under the roof of me and my wife.

When I see my son, uh, Elias, I can I can tell him confidently that the sins of the woman who birthed him do not define him.

I can tell him you were my son.

When I see my daughters, I'm able to tell them confidently, you're a beautiful creation made in the image of the Heavenly Father.

The bad things that happen to you from other people do not have hold on you.

And I can say that you are my daughter.

When my sons fail time and time again with things as simple as completing chores, I remind myself, my Father in heaven gives me more than enough grace and mercy to get up and try again.

I can say, son, let's do this together.

Let me teach you.

And then I pray for patience to do that, because it's very hard.

Church, I'm here to tell you that the sins of the past that you've committed and the sins that have been committed against you, they do not have any hold on you.

Because I've seen God set us free in our own lives, the love of Jesus is endless, and there is nothing that can pull the love of Jesus away from you.

Adoption to sonship means our identity is in Him.

Our birth records changed from filthy to pure.

The generations of sin are wiped out of our record.

The old name everyone knew is gone.

God calls us by name because he sees me and he knows me.

We just received the birth certificate just maybe a month ago.

And it is fascinating that in adoption today, Elias' birth parents are shown as me and Savannah.

Everything is completely changed through adoption.

The judge asked me on the stand if I understood this.

And that's when it hit me like bricks, and I was boohooing it is beautiful.

The same way I looked at Elias playing in the courtroom, saying, He is mine.

He has my name.

He lives in my house.

He is heir to my things.

He said to me, Son, you have my name.

Son, you belong in my house.

He said, Son, you are heir to the kingdom of God.

And with tears in his eyes, he embraces me, defining me by his love.

Nothing that I did deserves that.

This is why Paul describes a sharp difference in just obeying Christ as a slave and emphasizes that we are children adopted.

Then we are heirs, heirs to God and co-heirs with Christ.

If indeed we share in his sufferings, in order that we may also share in his glory.

So our second thing to remember we change and our desires change.

Verse 5 Our Father defines us, so our desires become his.

Amen.

It's not our time.

It's his.

Until we trust Jesus to reveal them in his time.

So some of my quotes this morning will come from a lot of things that I listen to.

I know Colton reads a lot, I listen a lot.

So this next uh quote is um technically from Forrest Frank.

If y'all know Forrest Frank, he's a musical music artist, and uh he became popular with his last album, and it's called Child of God, which fits perfectly for this morning.

So follow along with me.

Um this uh he released it as a song, but it's a recording he found of his grandfather um who was traveling with Billy Graham in 1985 with uh the Fort Lauderdale Crusade.

And so uh follow along with me.

Uh this is his testimony that he gives the crowd.

Several years ago, I came out of church one Sunday morning, met an airline pilot, and he asked me a very simple question.

He said, What are you really doing here?

I thought for a minute and I said, Well, I got small children, and I think it's important that they be in Sunday school.

He said, if there's something here for you, for them, don't you think there's something here for you?

How dare this guy challenge me on what I was doing every morning?

But when I came home after the anger subsided, I became more rational.

And if I was honest with you tonight, I'm telling you, I set out to prove that there was no God so that I could go to the golf course on Sunday morning and not have my conscience bother me.

But one day in frustration, driving down I-95, going to work, I just looked up and said, God, I confess that I'm a sinner.

If that's what selfishness is, then I'm a sinner.

And you know what happened?

Nothing.

I didn't see angels, I didn't hear the heavenly choir, I didn't have any sense of peace.

I just put it on down the road and went to work.

Got home that night and almost forgot about the incident, and I picked up my Bible, and see I'm trying to prove that there is no God.

And somebody messed with my book.

Somebody messed with my book.

I understood things that I didn't understand the night before.

That's right, that's right.

I it says in the fourth chapter of 2 Corinthians, but there is a veil over the eyes of the unbeliever that they cannot discern the truth.

But it says in the third chapter, when you turn in repentance, that veil is lifted.

And that veil was lifted, and I became a new creature in Christ Jesus, and my, you bet there was a change in my life, a change in my value system, a change in my understanding, and certainly a change in my concept of this person of Christ.

And so 2 Corinthians chapter 4, it says, It's like a veil over your eyes.

2 Corinthians 4 · chapter mention

We are blinded as sinners.

Until the time the veil is lifted, he explains in chapter 3, Paul says that we turn in repentance, that the veil is lifted, the veil that only Christ can take away.

Then we can see, we can see the glory of the Lord.

And that's in his time.

And uh this this analogy, Colton's mentioned this before, so I've got to give him credit for this one.

In Homer's book, The Iliad, he tells the story of the Odyssey and the Sirens.

If you're not familiar with this, the sirens were sea creatures who sang a seductive song to sailors on ships as they passed by.

And it was so enticing that the crew would follow the sirens of siren's song, ultimately to their death.

Author and priest Brennan Manning writes this Odysseus was warned of the sirens, and to avert the danger of the sirens, he had himself bound to the ship and filled his ears, uh had his crew fill his ears with wax, and that they might not hear the charming music and be drawn to towards their death.

And by being tied down and clogging their ears, they avoided the danger.

Another man, Orpheus, however, on another crew that was passing the sirens, he did not plug his ears, he didn't tie himself down to the ship.

He simply took out his lyre and played a more beautiful tune and made sweeter music.

And he and his crew passed by the sirens in safety because they were captivated by a better song.

In church, our desires become so much sweeter than the distractions of this world.

The sirens who seduc the sailors passing through, they were uh there were two ways to get by without dying.

First was chaining themselves, putting wax in their ears, and the second was creating a new song that was so much sweeter than any distraction.

Our new desire that God gives us is like this.

Because we have found a new identity, we were able to sing a song so much sweeter than any distraction.

Because the veil has been lifted from our eyes to experience the goodness and love of Jesus Christ.

So this leads us to our third point.

Number one, we're adopted.

Two, our desires change.

Three, we get to experience.

A new life.

Our Father gives us a new life.

Verse 11 if the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you.

Did you catch that, church?

The power that raised Jesus from the dead is living in you.

The most radical miracle that has had more evidence than any other in history, that power of God is in us.

I can see this clearly in our children.

Our kids live in our home, and because of this, there is life that is offered for them.

Much like our testimony, our story of change, because of Jesus only starts with his power that's in us.

I can give my kids a bike.

This bike has so much power they can learn to use it, and this bike can bring them joy and adventure.

This bike may uh will make them celebrate how awesome life can be.

In the same way, our Father in heaven gives us power in us so that we can see his goodness and share how fun this power can be.

Sometimes we fall off our bike and it hurts, right?

But just like a good father would, I would equip my children to learn first.

Training wheels, easy paths, and then hills and then mountains, and then it that's when the fun starts, right?

I would protect my kids with a proper protection.

When they fall, I help them up and encourage them.

We are equipped to receive and live a new life through Christ Jesus.

Theologian uh Brenna Blaine was on a podcast with uh LaCrae, the deep end of Lecrae.

In context, she explains um trauma that she's been through and that she's been exposed to and how God saved her and is still healing her as an adult.

She writes and preaches on the goodness of God now.

So this is uh part of what she was explaining as her testimony on this podcast.

At 10 years old, we are sitting in church doing object lessons about being kind to your siblings and not lying to your parents.

And I'm like, well, that's all well and grade, but I experience trauma that's common in foster kids.

And so where's the God in that?

Like, why does God care about if I lie to my parents?

But it seems as if he doesn't care about me being abused.

And so that's when it when I realized this God that I've been fed for the first 10 years of my life was not big enough.

Church, I I know I've felt this in our home.

I felt this in my life.

Um, listen to me when I say this.

Our God is greater than any trauma or abuse you could go through.

He's bigger than any molestation, rape, addiction of any kind.

He is bigger than the lie, cheat, murder that we're still committed against you.

We are given new life.

Our God is greater.

Just as a good father cares for his children, how much more will our Father in heaven care for us?

Church, there is so much freedom in the title of heirs adopted into Christ.

Our desires become his and we are given new life.

The sins of our past do not define us.

The generational sin in our mortal families do not define us.

Our Father in heaven does, and he gives us the power to see his kingdom come on earth.

When our eyes are opened, we can experience the fame of our God.

We can see his good works and his good deeds in our everyday.

So, how do we apply this in our lives?

With adoption.

Be confident.

Know who your father is.

That's who defines you.

With our desires.

Our desires only change when we spend time with our father.

This past school year, my son's dressed up for a special day at school.

It was uh dressed like Mom or Dad Day.

And so to dress like dad, they um put on boots, their shorts, their crazy shirts, wore a coffee hat, and took coffee to the teacher saying, Hey, Jesus loves you.

They knew exactly what to do.

And so this is because they spend time with me and they know me.

Our children pick up on the things that we say, on the way we act, and they imitate us.

Spend time in the living word.

Study together as a church, and your desires will become God our fathers.

You are given new life.

Celebrate and know that this life we have gives hope in the kingdom come.

You can look back on your past, knowing what God redeemed from us, and celebrate with one another, because our God will keep his promises.

Where in your life do you feel a push of discomfort?

Maybe it's a renewal of the mindset that we are adopted in Christ.

Maybe it's a feeling of uh a need to get involved.

Um, there are many ministries in town uh that C3 is connected to, that I'm connected with, uh, that we can uh show you how you you can serve kids in need, uh, different ministries we serve Calvary.

Umbe it's jumping in the fire like we did.

Church, we are adopted.

If the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Jesus Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you.

I want to end with this quote from a pastor in Waco, Texas, Jonathan uh Pakluda.

He says, This, I have dear friends who've adopted children.

And they said the hardest part was filling out the questionnaire, asking you what kind of challenges you're willing to live with, what kind of disabilities, as the world would call them.

You're okay with uh within a child that you're going to adopt.

Like, are you okay if they can't walk?

If they're paralyzed, if they're in a wheelchair and you've got to push them?

Are you okay if they can't eat and have feeding tube?

Are you okay if they have some mental disabilities and they're not able to learn?

Or they lack cognitive functions, their brains not working as a normal brain would.

Are those things that you're are those things that you're alright with?

And do you think, man, if I don't choose that child, who will?

If I say I'm not okay with that, then what's going to happen to that person, that living being?

And what I love when I'm thinking about God adopting us is that he says, I'll take that one.

I'll take that one that's stuck in pornography, like a dog to its vomit.

He keeps going back to his sin.

I'll take her when she's starving herself.

I'll take the one who looks in the mirror and hates what she sees.

I'll take the person who sits with the razor blade cutting their arm.

I'll take the one who constantly thinks of himself, walks in a room and wonders what everyone is saying about them or thinking about them.

They're enslaved to their insecurity.

And the list goes on and on and on and on, and there's no disqualifying disability that the Lord turns away.

There's no one that God says, Oh, they're too far gone.

I can't save them.

Jesus' blood is not enough.

That he didn't die for them.

Anyone who would trust in death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins can be adopted as God's children.

We can be his kids, not his slaves, not his workers, not people who are trying to earn our allowance, but someone who's trying to earn a raise, earn a wage, but women and men who have been adopted by the Creator of the heavens and of the earth to be his children, to call him Abba Father.

Church, uh, pray with me.

God, we we are here for you this morning.

Um thank you for the reminder that we we are loved that much.

That we are adopted by you, God, that you give us new desires.

God, that you change our life.

God, I pray that we can have our eyes open to your greatness, your glory every day.

God, reveal new things in our hearts so we can come to you and love you more.

We love you.

Amen.