You can follow today’s passage by clicking on this sentence.
As I read this passage today and therefore write these few brief thoughts, I have to confess, the idea of the Spirit crying ‘Abba, Father!’ from my heart to God feels a bit unlikely. But isn’t that the point and one of the most beautiful aspects of what Paul is saying here? If we base the success of our lives of faith (or our lives in general) on how feel, how our thoughts have developed or progressed over a period time, the perspective we now view them from, we run the risk of finding ourselves in a constant state of confusion and flux. I’ll be the first to admit that there’s very little about which I am certain at the present time. However, the concept that the Spirit dwells in the hearts of the baptised and acknowledges God, whatever the weather, whatever my feelings or sense of failings might be, if that were true, it would be revolutionary. At a stroke, faith ceases again to be about effort, success or failure, finding the right, pious or reverent way of doing things and instead becomes a task of acceptance: acceptance of mercy, grace, forgiveness, opportunity, possibility and hope. My sense of who I am may change with how I feel, but the actuality of who I am, in light of what God has done and who Jesus is, that does not change. God has done it. He has placed his self in me. Christ in me the hope of glory. My hope is not me. It is so much more and so much greater than that. What a relief!