The sermon 'Walking In the Footsteps of a Loving Father' by Jason Dohm explores Ephesians 4:25-5:2, emphasizing the call for Christians to imitate God as beloved children. The speaker highlights the importance of understanding the context of biblical texts to avoid misinterpretations. He explains that while Jesus is a perfect example, imitating God involves a continuous growth process, becoming more like Christ. The sermon underscores the significance of God's undeserved, intentional, and faithful love, which believers are to reflect in their lives. By examining the metaphor of a Parker pen, Dohm illustrates how the love and example of a father can inspire children to follow in their footsteps. The sermon emphasizes the concept of 'walking in love,' characterized by sacrificial and active love, as demonstrated by Jesus on the cross. The speaker challenges listeners to examine their own lives to ensure that their love is not merely sentimental but is evidenced by actions. Christians are encouraged to view obedience as a privilege and pleasure, rooted in the spirit of adoption, which fosters a close, affectionate relationship with God.

Our sermon text this week is from Ephesians chapter 4 starting at verse 25 on to chapter 5 verse 2 and I'm going to start us off in verse 17. This I say therefore and testify in the Lord that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk in the futility of their mind having their understanding darken being alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them because of the blindness of their heart, who being past feeling, have given themselves over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness. But you have not so learned Christ, if indeed you have learned Him and have been taught by Him as the truth is in Jesus. That you put off concerning your former conduct the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which is created according to God in true righteousness and holiness. Therefore, putting away lying, let each one of you speak truth with his neighbor, for we are members of one another.

Be angry and do not sin. Do not let the Son go down on your wrath nor give place to the devil. Let him who stole steal no longer, but rather let him labor, working with his hands, what is good, that he may have something to give him who has need. Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.

Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away with you, be put away from you with all malice. And be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God and Christ forgave you. Therefore be imitators of God as dear children and walk in love as Christ also has loved us and given himself for us in offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling aroma. The title of the sermon this morning is Walking in the Footsteps of a Loving Father. If you know children who have a good loving father, you find children who imitate him.

You find little patterns about them that remind you so much of their dad. In some ways this text is like that. It's just a little reflection of our calling to walk in the footsteps of our loving Heavenly Father. Judging by its popularity, Wikipedia says that 50 million copies of this book have been sold since 1896 when the first edition went out. You might have heard of In His Steps.

Did you know it was that old? I didn't know it was that old. 1896 was the first edition. They sold 50 million copies and it popularized WWJD. Have you seen people wearing bracelets?

WWJD. What would Jesus do? Well it's not always the right question. Sometimes he might raise the dead. And you're probably not going to be able to do that.

Sometimes he would do things in his perfect power and in his perfect wisdom that is out of our reach. But it's very often the right question for Christians. What would Jesus do? He's our perfect example in every category. And our text today certainly puts us right on that track.

What would Jesus do? Paul sort of asks and answers that question in our text. As we go to our text, let's ask the Lord to help us. Our God, this is a text about your love for us, and we stand in awe of the thought that you would love us. Why would you love us?

Why would you even be mindful of us In a universe of this great expansiveness, why would we even draw your attention, even though we're the works of your hands you made us? But your Word declares with such wonderful clarity that you do more than take notice of us that you love your children with the heart of a father. This is humbling, but it makes us so happy to consider this great truth of scripture. So I thank you that you brought us to this text and I pray that you would use it for our great encouragement today in Jesus name, Amen. We have a short scope this morning, just two verses.

So how long can that take? Well, we're about to answer that question. Let's re-read the first verse. We'll just take it verse at a time. Let's reread the first verse.

Ephesians 5 verse 1. Paul writes, Therefore be imitators of God as dear children." In this verse Paul says before us, beloved children who imitate their father. So if you're taking notes on the handout, filling in blanks, imitate fills in the blanks. The blank, beloved children who imitate their father. Now what is the context?

After all, a text, we're in a text, without a context, is a pretext. Do you know what a pretext is? The definition of a pretext is an excuse to say something that isn't accurate. Have you ever known anybody to do that with the Bible? They pluck out a verse from its context as an excuse to make the Bible say something that it doesn't really say.

If you actually look at it with what comes before it and what goes after it, you say, yeah, that's not what that means. A text without a context is a pretext. It's an excuse to say something that's not accurate. So we never understand any of the text that we study unless we understand at least a little something about what goes before it and what comes after it and how the text that we're studying fits into the flow of thought that the author is getting at. The author is getting at something here.

So From the context, what is the author getting at? Well the larger context is chapter 4. This is the first two verses in chapter 5. So this is flowing out of a stream of thought that Paul has been developing. And That stream of thought is a call to become increasingly like the Lord Jesus.

When we are born again, those who have trusted everything to Christ, you start out not very like Jesus at all, and then it's our lifetime's work to become more and more like Christ as the Holy Spirit would work in us and give us strength to do that. So that is the calling In chapter 4, it starts with the call to walk worthy. So chapters 1-3, riches to the believer, and Paul piles up the riches. And then in chapter 4, there is this call to walk worthy of the riches that have been just poured out on the believer, poured out on the Christian. And then Paul begins to explain that.

Well, what would it mean to walk worthy of this calling of riches? Verse 13, chapter 4 verse 13 is part of that explanation. He says, Until we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to a perfect man to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." So Paul gives us the target right there in verse thirteen. To the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. And he just called him a perfect man.

So we know who we are supposed to follow after, pattern ourselves after, the perfect man. The measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. The immediate context is the last verse before chapter 5. So this is chapter 4 verse 32. Look back at that.

The last verse before our text today was this, and be kind to one another, tender hearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you. So he just opened up this theme of imitating God in the last verse of chapter 4 in our call to forgive one another, even as God in Christ forgave us. So we have a pattern for forgiveness. We don't make up what that looks like. We know what it looks like because God has forgiven the believer in Jesus Christ, and so we forgive one another even as God and Christ forgave us.

So that brings us to our text, chapter 5 verse 1, where Paul starts out, Therefore. So he just said it in the context, the larger context of chapter 4, and the immediate context of that verse that we just came out of where we're called to forgive even as God and Christ forgave us. That's the context. So with that context as our framework, Paul tells us what to do. Do you like people telling you what to do?

Paul tells you what to do. And he gives us a basis for doing it. What should we do? Imitate God. But I thought we were growing in Christ-likeness.

I thought we were imitating Jesus. Well there's two things to say about that. They're pretty obvious. The first is Jesus is God. So there's no contradiction between saying imitate God and imitate Jesus.

Jesus is God, so no problem there. The second thing to say is Jesus is the fullest revelation of God. If You want to know God, you don't look to see God and what He is acting like. Although we can see His dealings with mankind in Scripture, you don't see it like you see it in Jesus Christ. Jesus is the fullest revelation of God, both in what he taught.

We have four books in the New Testament, Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, full of what he taught, and in how he lived while he dwelt among us. Jesus took on flesh, he became a man, and he lived a lifetime. He is the fullest revelation of God, both in what he taught during his lifetime and how he lived during his lifetime. John 1 verse 18. Listen to what John the Gospel writer says in John 1 verse 18.

No one has seen God at any time. He's talking about God the Father. Has anyone seen God the Father at any time? John the Gospel writer says no, no one. No one has seen God at any time.

The only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him. Jesus is the ultimate revelation of God. If you want to know God who no one has ever seen, look at Christ. No one has ever seen God, but the only begotten Son, He has declared Him. So how do we imitate God?

Well, we have a book. There's a book. And it says a lot, yes, but the contents of that book, how you live it out, has been fleshed out. Fleshed out how? Well, Jesus came and took on the form of a man.

So we can look at his life as recorded in the gospels and know if we are going to live out this book it looks like this. How does a man who is conforming himself to imitating God, what does he say? Well We can look at what Jesus said, how He related with people. How does He act? We can look at how Jesus acted.

It has been fleshed out very literally. Imitate God sounds straightforward enough, doesn't it? It's two words. Imitate God. How hard can that be?

Well, consider what God says in Isaiah 55 verses 8 and 9. This is Isaiah Chapter 55 verses 8 and 9. Here's what God says there. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts." So we might say, okay, I'm out to imitate God, but God has said there's a great disconnect between His thoughts and our thoughts.

As far as the distance between the heavens and the earth, there's a disconnect between our thoughts, our natural thinking, and God's thoughts, and His ways and our ways. There's this great chasm between the two. So you might set out to imitate God, but rely on your thoughts and your ways and end up in completely the wrong place. So this is the value of this book and especially the fleshing out of what living out this book looks like on planet Earth, looking at the life of Jesus and seeing how he acts. What would Jesus do is a wonderful, helpful question.

What would Jesus do? Listen to what Harold Honer says. He is our Greek scholar who I have been reading every week. He really breaks down the Greek language, which is what the New Testament was written in, so that you get sort of the linguistic nuances of the language that it was written in. Harold Hohner says this, Paul uses the present imperative to become rather than to be.

So our Greek scholar says that rather than Therefore be imitators of God a more accurate Rendering of what it actually exists in the original language in which this was written Greek would be therefore become imitators of God In other words, I think we know this intuitively, this is not an all or nothing proposition. Be imitators of God. You weren't, but now you are. Well, there's a continuum here. There are gradations here.

It's not that we didn't imitate God in any way. I'm a believer, but I haven't imitated God in any way and now I need to imitate Him in every way. There is a growth path here in which we are becoming imitators of God. We are growing in our imitation of God, and specifically of the Lord Jesus Christ. Harold Hoener finishes that quote by saying, They are to develop continuously into imitators of God.

So this is how we should think of ourselves in the Christian life, developing continually as imitators of God. And what is the basis that Paul gives us for imitating God? Here it is. God the Father is perfectly undeserved, yet perfectly intended and faithful love for His children. As dear children.

Be imitators of God. He told you what to do. Now he gives you the basis for it as dear children. The Father is perfectly undeserved. Do you deserve the love of God?

No. Not if you believe what the Bible says. In fact, not only is it not deserved, it's the opposite of what I deserved. I deserved his anger against my rebellion, but instead of anger against my rebellion, for some reason he decided to be kind to me and to make me an object of His love. My Father is perfectly undeserved, yet perfectly intended.

He meant to do it before I ever breathed a breath. He chose me before the foundations of the world to receive his mercy, to be an object of his love. So it was perfectly intended and faithful, perfectly faithful love for his children. The word here is agape. I knew I was gonna, I thought I thought it would be here is agape is the root.

Agape is the root. As deer children, the root of the word that is being translated dear here is agape, and it's just a form of that because it's in the word family that comes from this root. It comes from the Greek word for undeserved love, unconditional love that seeks the good of the object of love. We've heard it in many sermons as agape. I can say that.

We'll leave it at that. That's the root. That's why the NASB and the ESV translations render it beloved, as beloved children, and the NIV renders it as dearly beloved, as dearly beloved children. Now let's bring this together with what Paul has already been saying. Turn back to Ephesians 1 verse 6.

Here's what we see in Ephesians 1 verse 6. To the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the beloved. So this is the end of that section in chapter one where the role of God the Father in saving sinners ends in praising God the Father for his work in saving sinners. To the praise of the glory of His grace, God the Father's grace, by which He, God the Father, made us accepted in the beloved. It's the same word family with agape at the root.

We are accepted in the Lord Jesus Christ because He is the loved one of God, loved by God in a very special, unique way. God dearly loves His only begotten Son. And so all who are united to His dearly beloved Son by faith are now in Christ, united to Him by faith, and they come into that dear love. So you get the flow of thought here. Since God loves His unique Son, His only begotten Son, so dearly.

When you are joined to Him by faith, you come into that love. You are the recipient of the love that God has for His own Son, because you have been united to Him by faith. You are joined to Him. Think of God's love for His Son Jesus. Then think of God's love for His adopted children if He would give that Son to adopt those children.

God has loved this son from all eternity, but he was willing to give up that son to adopt children, to pave the way to adopt children into his family. So think how much now he must love those children to have given this son for them. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life." It's probably the most famous verse in the whole Bible, John 3.16. Now, having been adopted, having been given a new heart of flesh in place of my old stony heart made alive, I am to learn to think what He thinks, my Father thinks. And I am to learn to say what He says.

And I am to learn to act as he acts. I'm to grow. You're going to do that all at once? You're going to think like God thinks all at once? No, you grow.

Are you going to say what he says all at once? No, you grow. Are you going to act as he acts? No, you grow. Friends, Christians are not slaves who are working to eke out an existence by working for a master.

Christians are dearly loved children who so adore the goodness of their Father that it is privilege and pleasure to walk in his steps. We should think of obedience that way. As dearly loved children, as the object of God the Father's love for us, we should think of obedience as privilege and pleasure, not as slaves eking out in existence, by working for a master, by slaving away for a master. Think of obedience. Think of growing in thinking like he thinks, speaking like he speaks, acting like he acts, as privilege and pleasure.

What a pleasure to walk in the footsteps of this perfectly good father. Before moving on, let me give you a small example, just a tiny little example. In 2013, So eight years ago, I posted a blog post online entitled My Parker Pen. I brought it with me. Stainless steel, it's got this little arrow clip, and you can put it in your pocket, and the arrow holds the pen in place.

So this is my Parker pen. And then it has a picture that looks like that. It's me smiling with my Parker pen. And then here's a part of the post. Dear Sovereign Redeemer and other friends, this is me and my Parker pen.

It goes with me everywhere. I can't imagine not having it. I don't know if it is the best writing pen because I don't try other pens. When it finally stops working and the time has come to replace it, I will buy, you guessed it, another Parker pen. To what does the Parker company owe such undying brand loyalty?

My dad carried a Parker pen. Just like this one. Period. End of story. I am 43.

I'm 51 now. I am 51 and I always carry a Parker pen because my dad carried one and I love my dad. I am deadly serious. And then I ended the post this way. So don't laugh at my love for my Parker pen.

It isn't the pen. Some dads are reading this. I want to address you, to plead with you, to recognize the advantage God Himself has given you, so that you can disproportionately influence your sons and daughters. Use it. Leverage it for the glory of your Redeemer.

It will make a world of difference in each life, and maybe one day you will notice that they have an irrational attachment to some silly thing like a pen. And you will know that you are dearly loved for who you are, and all that you have invested in them. I really do have an irrational attachment to the silly pen. There's no law, there's no law binding me to the Parker pen. It's simply that I was a dearly loved son, and so I dearly loved my dad.

And it makes me want to use a Parker pen. As silly as that is. That's sort of a small way in which sons and daughters who have been well loved by a good and affectionate father, in a sense, they lose the need for the law to bind them to walking in the footsteps of this Father. I'm not preaching as an antinomian to say, we shouldn't worry about the law anymore. That's not what I'm saying.

But when you are a well-loved child of a perfectly good father, you shouldn't need to be bound to the law to walk in the footsteps of a father who has loved you so well. That's really the point of what Paul is getting at. So moving on to the second verse. Ephesians 5 verse 2. And walk in love as Christ also has loved us and given himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling aroma.

Here in verse 2, Paul gives us the priority. What's the priority? Walking in Christ-like love. Christ-like fills in the blanks if you're taking notes that way. Walking in Christ-like love is the priority.

What's the essence of imitating God? What's at the very core and heart of walking in the footsteps of a perfectly good Father who has loved you well. Loving others, walking in love. Paul says, and walk in love. It is a continuation of what he just said when he called us to become imitators of God as dear children.

It is an explanation of what it means to imitate God as dearly loved children. I've been adopted by this wonderful Father. How do I imitate Him? I walk in love. There is that word again.

What word? Walk. This means not just a moment in time. A moment in time wouldn't be walking in anything. That's just a snapshot.

You have good moments, you have not good moments, but you're not characterized by any one snapshot of your life. You're characterized by your patterns of life. You're known by your habits, your life patterns. That's what the walk is. It's an established pattern of life.

This is the fifth time that we've seen that term walk in Ephesians, and we're going to see it two more. So it's a major theme in the book, the walk. I want to look quickly at the two times that we saw it in chapter 4. I won't go all the way back to the beginning of the book, but we'll content ourselves for now with the two times we saw it in chapter 4. Look at chapter 4 verse 1.

I therefore the prisoner of the Lord beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called. So This is what Paul is pleading for followers of the Lord Jesus Christ to do, to walk worthy, to labor, to establish life patterns, not just snapshots where we do something that is Christ like every once in a while. No, to establish life patterns that look like and sound like the Lord Jesus Christ. And the things that we find in scripture to walk worthy, to have life patterns that are worthy of the riches that we've received. The other place that we see it in chapter 4 is chapter 4 verse 17.

Look at that, chapter 4 verse 17. This I say therefore, in testifying the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk in the futility of their mind. So In calling us to a new walk, he is calling us out of the old walk. The walk of the old man, this is part of that whole put off the old man section. To not walk, no longer walk, as the rest of the Gentiles walk.

You used to walk that way, this has been the whole argument of Ephesians. You used to walk that way in the futility of your mind. You were thinking wrong about so many things. Now the patterns of your life reflected those thought patterns, and now we have to come out of that because we're a changed people, we're a transformed people, and that has to be evident in our lives. So we are to walk in love.

And not a snapshot, not have a loving incident. Every once in a while have a loving incident, but to develop a pattern of life that is characterized by love. Love is a habit. Love as a habit. Paul, could we please have a definition, so that we make sure that we're not thinking wrong about love, and then we go off thinking we're building patterns of life of love, but we've defined it wrong, and so we misunderstood what you're saying, so we didn't do what you really were asking us to do.

Okay, says Paul, walk in love as Christ also has loved us and given himself for us. That is the description and that is the standard. Walk in love as Christ also has loved us and given himself for us. Loving as the Lord Jesus Christ loved us which includes his death as a substitute on the cross. This is pointing to the cross.

Look at the end of verse 5 again. An offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling aroma. That's pointing at the cross. This is drawing on Old Testament language for animal sacrifices. Old Testament is filled with all sorts of language about the temple worship, which was filled with animal sacrifice.

It talked about these offerings, these sacrifices, and it says in many many places in both Exodus and Leviticus it speaks of them as a sweet smelling aroma to God. So it's saying that Jesus' offering himself up is like the Old Testament sacrifices that were substitutionary in nature and blameless innocent animal dying to bear the sins of the people. This was just a picture that pointed forward to Jesus and he fulfills that. These sacrifices come up before God as a satisfying, acceptable, sweet smelling aroma to him. Later in this same chapter, Paul will narrow his instructions to husbands and wives.

Look at Ephesians 525. Husbands, love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for her. So he uses the same language again, but he brings it into the marriage relationship. So he's going to narrow it at the end of the chapter, but at the beginning of the chapter here it's really much broader than that. It's talking about a total life pattern of love and loving as Christ loved.

So the love Paul is talking about is more than sentimental. It is also highly practical and active. It is a sacrificing love, a giving love. We don't want to strip the emotion out of it as if it's all sacrifice and all giving. No, the heart is in it.

God's heart was in it when he sent Jesus, and Jesus' heart was in it when he offered himself up. So please don't say that I'm or think that I'm stripping the emotional element out of it. No, no, no. I'm just saying it goes beyond just the emotional element to include action. It is real affection that moves me to action towards the object of love.

It is more than sentimental. It is highly practical and active. It is a sacrificing love. It is a giving love. Here's what John said in 1 John 3.16.

Not the Gospel of John, but the first letter of John chapter 3 verse 16. By this we know love because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. So it couldn't be more explicit than there in 1 John 3, 16. By this we know love.

We know what love is by looking to the cross that Jesus not only had affection for us sentimentally, emotionally, but that affection sent him to the cross to make a way that our sins could be pardoned. And then that lays a basis for how we ought to relate to one another. We ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. Here's a question that we keep returning to in different contexts. Would there be enough evidence to convict?

Would there be enough evidence to convict? So let's apply it to this context. If Jesus was charged with loving his people, the judges would have to rule that the evidence was overwhelming. Would there be enough evidence to convict Jesus of loving his people? Jesus, we charge you that you have loved your people.

And the judge would have to say, the evidence is overwhelming. And You could offer more evidence than the cross, but you couldn't offer better evidence than the cross. The affection that Jesus had for his people sent him to the cross to die. It is overwhelming evidence, incontrovertible proof that Jesus loves His people. It's been proven beyond all reasonable doubt.

What does Jesus say in John 10, 17 and 18? Listen to Jesus' words from John 10, 17 and 18. Jesus says, Therefore my Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of myself." Jesus says, no one takes my life from me, I lay it down of myself. The cross was not things spiraling out of control.

At the cross things were perfectly in control. It was Jesus doing exactly what He meant to do, exactly what He came to do to display His love and to reconcile sinners to himself. And was Jesus' sacrifice of his life accepted as an offering for the guilt of my sins, since I have placed my trust in him? It is a sweet smelling aroma. It comes up to God and it is satisfying and accepted and sweet before Him.

It really is finished. When Jesus said that on the cross, it is finished. Know that this sacrifice is a sweet smelling aroma to God. That He is satisfied with it, that He accepts it, that He is pleased with it. That there's nothing left undone, but it's a sweet smelling aroma, perfectly satisfying to God, pleasing to God.

Nothing left for us to do. Before we go to applications, let me take you to a place where I believe Jesus brings this all together and it's Matthew chapter 5. So turn to Matthew chapter 5 and we'll end there and then apply. Matthew chapter 5, Very end of the chapter. Matthew 5 verses 43 through 48.

Jesus says, You have heard that It was said, You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies. Bless those who persecute you. Do good to those who hate you. And pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven." So this is right back to imitating God.

Love your enemies that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. For he makes his Son rise on the evil, and on the good, and sends rain on the just, and on the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others?

Do not even the tax collectors do so? Therefore, you shall be perfect just as your Father in heaven is perfect. Jesus, all the way back in Matthew chapter 5, meaning early in his life, was telling people to look to God the Father who sends the rain on the just and on the unjust. Not because He can't separate out, but because He intends to do good to all, regardless of how they respond to Him. We are to be like our Father in Heaven, by loving, yes, our neighbor, but also our enemies, and those who curse us, and those who hate us, and those who spitefully use us and persecute us.

You can find texts in which we are called to love the brethren, and we love the brethren in a special way, but it's broader than that. Jesus makes it so clear in Matthew chapter 5 that the patterns of life for love that are being called for here go well beyond just inside the walls of the church or beyond professing Christians and it includes even our enemies. Applications, let me give you two. Both in the form of a question. So question number one or application number one.

Do you have the spirit of adoption? Listen to what Paul writes in Romans 8 15. Romans chapter 8, verse 15. Paul writes to these Roman believers, he's writing to believers, so this is for the believer. For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the spirit of adoption by whom we cry out Abba Father." So the Greek is written in New Testament, excuse me, the New Testament is written in Greek.

Wow! The New Testament is written in Greek. So all of that in the original writing would have been Greek except for Abba. You have received the spirit of adoption by whom we cry out Abba, Father. Abba was Aramaic, which is the language they were speaking.

So they wrote the New Testament in Greek, but they would have been speaking Aramaic. So it's the word for father in the language that they would be speaking, but there were options. There was more than one word for father, and this was the close, personal, affectionate term for father. So It hasn't been translated here, it's really been brought over, it's been transliterated from the language that they would be speaking. A lot of commentators say the modern equivalent is daddy.

The close, affectionate, personal term for father. Affectionate personal term for father. Here in Romans 8.15 Paul is saying that the believer has received the Spirit of Adoption, the Holy Spirit that gives us this impulse to view God and see God and call God by this close personal affectionate name for Father. Do you have the spirit of adoption? This is where it starts.

The call to imitate God is nothing because we are to imitate God as dear children. If you lose the basis, then The exhortation to do this thing is lost. You are nowhere without the spirit of adoption that gives you the impulse to view God and think of God and speak to God in the closest, most personal, most affectionate way. Is God that to you? This is the starting point for our text.

In the same way that I need no law to tell me to use the Parker pen. Do you need a law to tell you to love? We need to be beyond that. We need to have the spirit of adoption in us that calls out Abba Father, that gives us that impulse that's so close and personal and affectionate. If you don't know God that way, seek to know Him.

It probably means you don't know Him at all. I don't want to overstep there because I know that feelings come and go. I don't want to talk any of God's children out of having a sense of being saved. The second question. It's for me, and yours is for Is my love disproportionately sentimental?

If I got drug into court and charged with loving my brethren, enough evidence to convict? Or would it be thrown out for lack of evidence. If your love is disproportionately sentimental, meaning it's all emotion but no action, then your case is getting thrown out of court for lack of evidence. That's true. Sometimes we've convinced ourselves that we're loving because we feel these affectionate things, but it's not affection that runs deep enough to actually move us to action.

And we should suspect that. The scriptures would teach us to be suspicious of a love that is overwhelmingly sentimental. Let's ask for the Lord's help. God, thank you for your love for us. So easy to jet past those two words, Dear children, and to get right to the command to us to imitate you, and to let the basis be eroded through lack of attention.

The beauty in this text comes from your great and undeniable love for your children. And I pray that you would have us clinging to that with all of our might. We would have this impulse to think of you and call upon you as Abba Father in the closest, most personal, most affectionate way. And that in a sense we wouldn't need the laws. We would have a desire to walk in your footsteps.

To walk in love. Thank you for bringing us to these texts which help us think more deeply about these things and to see ways in which we are not what we ought to be and we cry out for your help that you would help us in Jesus' name, amen.