For ye have not received a spirit of bondage again for fear, but ye have received a spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.
Paul has just said that those led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. Now he says what that Spirit is not: not a spirit that drives a person back into dread, but the Spirit by which a guilty sinner comes to call God "Father."
One writer lines up three things Scripture says believers have not received:
We are told we have not received "the spirit of the world," which we know is taken up only with the things of earth, of time, and of the senses — things that death shuts in on every side (1 Cor. 2:12). Nor have we received "the spirit of fear," that spirit of dread and torment that always broods over painful doubts and gloomy fears about what is coming (2 Tim. 1:7). Nor have we received "the spirit of bondage again to fear," tied to keeping rules and religious ceremonies, which can never free anyone from the fear of death (Rom. 8:15).
The word "again" points back to a real condition that people once lived in. It marks off the position of those under law from the position of the believer now.
They were Gentiles, and they were never put into the spiritual condition of believers in Old Testament times — above all of those under law, who through fear of death were held in bondage their whole life long. The gospel brought the Jewish believers out of that bondage. It met the Gentile just as fully, though he had never known the discipline of the law... The one as much as the other received a spirit of adoption or sonship.
Being given new life and knowing God as Father are treated here as two different things, the second waiting on the coming of the Spirit at Pentecost.
Believing souls could not take up and enjoy their relationship to the Father until the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost. To be born again is one thing: a change God's power works through the word. To know that God is our Father is another thing, and we can enjoy it only through the gift of the indwelling Spirit.
"Abba" is not a formal title. It is the word of a household, and commentators note that it had never before been used of God by a worshipper in Israel.
Under the law we never find in Scripture that a Jew said "Abba" to God. Israel was connected with God as Father in a national way only. God had called Israel a son, but it was collective, it was national. No one then could ever say "Abba, Father" to God. But now, because Christ's work is finished, we have this liberty — a liberty that gives free access to the immediate presence of God... "Abba" simply means "Daddy." The Lord Himself said it only once, when He was in distress in the garden of Gethsemane.
Paul writes "we cry," yet elsewhere the Spirit is said to cry. Both are true at once, and the order matters: the Spirit is not sent to create the relationship but because the relationship already exists.
The Spirit of the Son of God is sent into the heart of the believer, not to make him a son, but because he is already such (Gal. 4:6)... The cry, Abba, Father, is our own; but the Spirit of the Son produces it. We cry Abba, because we know Him this way; but the power of that knowledge is the indwelling presence of the Son.
Human adoption can change a person's status and nothing more. One writer makes the point from the story of Moses:
You remember Pharaoh's daughter adopted Moses — an Israelite adopted into the royal family of Egypt! She could not, however, put into Moses a spirit of adoption, so when he became a man he broke it all off. Now, in His rich grace, God has done more than adopt us as His sons, with all the rights, dignity, and glory that go with it, as the royal family of heaven. He gave us the very "spirit of adoption," so that we are truly joined to His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ — not merely given a position.
If this verse rules fear out, then living in dread of God is not modesty.
There is no such thing recognised in Scripture as a Christian doubting he is saved. And it is a completely false claim to humility. If my Father forgives me, and I doubt His forgiveness, I am not trusting Him... There is no such thing in Scripture as a Christian without the Spirit of adoption, crying "Abba, Father."
- Not again. The believer's Spirit is not the spirit of the world, not a spirit of dread, and not the old bondage that left the fear of death in place.
- Not national. Israel's sonship was collective. No one under law called God "Abba" — the word a child uses at home.
- Not automatic. New birth is one thing. The settled knowledge that God is our Father comes through the indwelling Spirit.
- Not manufactured. The cry is truly ours, yet the Spirit produces it. He is sent because we are sons, not to make us sons.
- Not doubtful. Fear is ruled out, so doubting the Father's forgiveness is not humility. It is distrust.
The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit, that we are children of God.
This verse follows the cry "Abba! Father!" and answers a question every honest believer asks: how do I know the relationship is real? The answer sits in two phrases: the Spirit Himself, and with our spirit.
The subject of the sentence is a Person. One writer marks Him out plainly, and rules out a common way of chasing assurance.
We are sons, and by the Spirit we cry, "Abba, Father," conscious of being so. The Holy Spirit Himself (here we have Him clearly as a distinct Person) "bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God." It is a clear, definite testimony of the Spirit who dwells in us that we are such. It is not a matter of proving it by the word through examining ourselves — that is a false, unscriptural and harmful procedure. It is the testimony of the Holy Spirit Himself dwelling in us, which He bears to us as living in us.
The small preposition decides how assurance works. It rules out waiting for a voice or a moment.
This rules out all self-deception. Someone might copy others in calling God Father, but the Spirit also produces the inward consciousness of the relationship. It is important to notice that it does not say, bears witness to our spirit. If that were the wording, we might be waiting for some distinct testimony at a given moment to assure us that we were now God's children. The apostle says, "with our spirit." The indwelling Spirit produces in us feelings and affections that suit the relationship God has brought us into, and He leads us into the enjoyment of it. The child of God now knows the Father. He does not doubt that he is a child, because he carries within himself the assured consciousness of his relationship.
"With" implies a second voice alongside the first. Separate the two and nothing is left to lean on.
This passage, which causes no difficulty in experience, causes one when it is a question of saying what it means. If I separate the witness of the Spirit of God from my spirit, I am left with no witness at all. If I receive the witness of the Spirit, then I have two: I have the certainty in my own spirit that I am a child of God, and I have besides the witness of that Spirit who works in us as the Spirit of adoption. It is the Spirit of God in us who gives our spirit the strength to say that we are children of God.
This witness is quiet and private, yet real.
How is this witness borne to our sonship? The very fact of His presence within us testifies to it. By His presence He also forms within us affections suited to our relationship. He gives us desires after the enjoyment of the Father's love. He enables us in the holy intimacy of our filial place to cry, Abba, Father. He confirms to our souls the word we have trusted... No, it is not an audible testimony. Our spirit alone discerns and grasps it. But that makes it no less real — it makes it all the more real, because it is a living secret between ourselves and God.
How clearly you hear it is not fixed. It depends on how you walk.
Remember that the strength and clearness of His testimony will depend on conditions... When we are led, walking in simple, loving obedience and dependence, our spirit will discern His testimony to our sonship most clearly. But if we walk in a way that grieves Him, we shall listen in vain for His testimony, because we shall have grieved Him into silence.
The word "with" means two voices, not one. That matters most when your own voice is weak.
He does not leave the child's feeble voice alone. We are often tempted to doubt the testimony of our own renewed hearts, because it is often very feeble. Sometimes it is only the cry of a child. But the Spirit joins His mighty testimony to the feebleness of ours. He bears witness with our spirits that we are the children of God, and gives His value to both testimonies. Can we then doubt?
The word in verse 16 is not the word used in verse 14.
To understand this well, remember that all saints from Adam onward have been children of God. Until the cross of Christ, they did not have the position of sons of God. The Greek words in verse 14 and verse 16 are clearly different. The word in verse 16 implies birth. The word in verse 14 refers to the dignity of the position of the adopted... But the gift of the Spirit is a witness to us — within us — bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God. Old Testament saints did not have this witness. We enjoy the relationship of children today in the same measure that we pay attention to the witness of the Spirit.
- Witness, not verdict. The Spirit does not hand down a ruling from outside. He testifies with your spirit from inside. Assurance is a shared voice, never a solo one.
- Witness, not audit. Certainty does not come from examining yourself for evidence. One writer calls that method harmful. It comes from the Person who lives in you.
- Witness, not noise. You will hear no voice. The Spirit forms the affections of a child, and that quiet awareness is the testimony. Grieve Him and you will listen in vain.
- Witness, not strength. Where your own sense of relationship is only a child's feeble cry, He adds His testimony to it and lends it His weight.
- Witness to birth. The Spirit confirms family: you are children, born of God. Old Testament saints held that relationship without this inward witness of it.
And if children, heirs also heirs of God, and Christ's joint heirs; if indeed we suffer with [him], that we may also be glorified with [him].
Because we are God's children, we are also His heirs — and heirs together with Christ Himself. The verse ties something else to that title: a shared path of suffering now, leading to shared glory.
The verse does not argue toward heirship in stages. The relationship itself already carries it.
A Christian is an heir, as well as a child, an "heir of God" and a "fellow heir with Christ," Rom. 8:17… The inheritance goes with our being children: "if children, then heirs." The moment a person is in the position of a child, there is an heir.
The verse says "heirs of God." How far does that reach?
His witness to our spirit is this — that we are children of God. But if children, we are His heirs. This accordingly leads, as connected with the deliverance of the body, to the inheritance we are to possess. The extent is what God Himself, so to speak, possesses — the universe of God, whatever will be under Christ: and what will not? As He has made all, so He is heir of all. We are heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ.
"Fellow heirs" — older translations say "joint-heirs" — means the believer's future is bound to Christ's own. One writer finds the picture of it in Eve, the first woman, made as Adam's companion.
We shall see that God shows the church not only as enjoying the present blessing of communion, but also as joint-heir with Christ of His coming inheritance. When believers look at the glory of Christ, they are looking at their own glory, since they are "heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ." We see a picture of this in Eve. Eve was not a part of the creation, nor was she lord of it as Adam was; but she shared with him everything he inherited.
The wording is exact: with Him, not for Him. That difference decides who the verse includes.
Note, though: this is suffering with Christ, not for Him. To suffer for Christ is a privilege, a special gift of God; Phil. 1:29. You cannot be a Christian without suffering with Christ. How could the Spirit of Christ give us a different mind from the mind that was in Christ as He passed through this sad world?
Public persecution is not the only thing in view. The grief comes from carrying Christ's life through a world set against Him.
This suffering comes from having life in Him while we pass through a world where everything is against Him… Divine life here is surrounded by all that works out its own misery, estrangement, and rebellion against Him. So if suffering is the necessary result of that, it is an immense privilege to suffer with Christ, cheered along the road by the prospect of sharing His glory.
Our reigning with Christ does not depend in any way on our present suffering. Instead, suffering here is the appointed path for those who will share Christ's kingdom with Him.
The last phrase looks past a new body. It points to a public moment, when the whole universe sees the children of God with Christ.
The glory comes in again. Tribulation is the present thing, but the bright glorious future is coming. To me it seems impossible for a Christian not to suffer with Him… This goes beyond having glorified bodies; that happens when the Lord comes, but this at His appearing. When He comes to be glorified in His saints, we shall be glorified together before the eyes of the whole universe. What a future opens up before us! Glory upon glory! It is a privilege to suffer with Him — all privilege.
- Child — it starts with relationship, not achievement. The moment someone is a child, there is an heir.
- Heir — the inheritance is as large as what God Himself has: everything that will come under Christ.
- Co-heir — like Eve with Adam, believers share everything that is Christ's. His glory is their glory.
- Co-sufferer — this is suffering with Christ. His Spirit in us cannot hold a different mind while we live in a world set against Him. Suffering for Him is a further gift.
- Co-glorified — the suffering does not buy the glory. It is the appointed road to it, and it ends in glory shown before the whole universe.