IDENTITY: JOINT HEIRS

INTRO: (5 MIN)

Leona Helmsley - was a New York, chain-smoking, real estate mogul and business woman w/ a net worth of 5 billion dollars & a little MALTESE dog named Trouble. She was nicknamed the “QUEEN OF MEAN” for her cut throat style and abrasive personality. Leona has quite a complicated life and you can find documentaries on her explaining the details but what may be the most telling was the end of her life.

She died in 2007 due to heart failure as she was in her Connecticut home. She was then entombed in her 1.4 million dollar masoulem which she left 3 million dollars behind for so that it could be washed once a year.

But when a person w/ that much money dies, it grabs the headlines because everyone wants to know where the inheritance will go. Her only son had passed away years before he had left behind his wife and 4 kids, Helmsley’s Grandkids… naturally you’d assume that the grandkids would receive the money...

But remember TROUBLE?

Helmsley left behind $12 million dollars as an inheritance for he MALTESE - Trouble didn’t go to a pound, get put down, or get adopted. Trouble lived the good life w/ a FULL TIME caretaker who was paid $100,000 to watch trouble.

TRANSITION: Imagine how an inheritance would change the way you live. You’d be confident, happy, in need of nothing, and thankful. You might think “I’ll never get that” but the Bible says the Christian has an even better inheritance.

PROP: Live In Light of Your Inheritance

READ: Romans 8:17 “and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him.”

Heir = Someone who receives and inheritance. We need remember that we are heirs, that we have an amazing inheritance for at least 2 reasons.

NEED:

We can be quick to live like we don’t have what we do have

Depression

Weakness

Legalism

Ascetism

Some here are not heirs and I want to show you what you’re missing out on, in hopes that it might compel you to believe in the Gospel

IDENTITY: Like a prince who is heir of the THRONE, a son who is planning to take over the family business - we are heirs of God w/ Christ and need to live like it.

THESIS:

1. Heirs of God v.17a (6 Min)

EXPLAIN:

“If children” - important to note that the inheritance God gives is similar to any other - it is familial.

God has much to give but will only give it to some, those who are in His family through the adoption

God isn’t going to give His inheritance to anyone, he wont give it to a dog, He will give it to those qualified to receive it and the only people qualified to receive it are His children

col 1:12 “giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in Light.”

Let me pause and ask - do you meet the qualifications to being an heir of God? the qualification is that your His child through the adoption accomplished at salvation.

God’s Children love Him - 1 John 4:7-8 “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.”

God’s Children obey Him - John 14:15 ““If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.”

“Heirs also, heirs of God” - We are heirs of God the Father.

This is massive - you may remember last week that we said part of our identity is being a slave to either sin or to righteousness and now tonight we learn that THOUGH believers are slaves to righteousness, they are also more then that, they are sons and if sons, heirs.

I mean if you were to write your will right now, who would you choose to be the recipient?

someone close to you

someone you trust

someone you care about

God chose you - Christian (think on the love and care God has for you)

Matt 25:34 ““Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.”

But what about the specifics of this inheritance.

It’s one thing if its your broke friend or wealthier parents or RICH uncle - Because an inheritance is ONLY worth as much as the person who gives it.

God gives this inheritance - so its worth is infinite

Psalm 24:1 “The earth is the Lord’s, and all it contains, The world, and those who dwell in it.”

Psalm 50:10 ““For every beast of the forest is Mine, The cattle on a thousand hills.”

But what makes the inheritance so good is not that God gives us material but He gives us Himself.

That is why John writes in Rev 21:3 “And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is among men, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them,”

Your inheritance is awaiting you at death Christian, and it is primarliy uniterrupted, unhindered, perfect, constant & infinite access and communion with God

That feeling and reality you have when you are close to God after reading His word and praying and have no unconfessed sin - that is just a small taste of what awaits you in heaven.

APPLICATE:

How can we not look forward to this

2. Heirs with Christ v.17b (6 Min)

EXPLAIN:

We are not heirs because of our decision to be a Christian or because of our own morality, we are heirs because Eph 1:11 “also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will,”

We are heirs because God chose to save us through Jesus

2 Cor 8:9 “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich.”

See Jesus lived a rightous life - that means he never did what he shouldn’t have AND always did what he should have

Then on the cross He took the punishment you deserve for sin and gives you the righteousness that He earned

So that if you would turn from your sin and place your faith in Him - you become inextricably linked to Him.

Your sin is treated like it was His & His life is viewed like it is yours - you get the credit for all His work, He gets the punishment for all your sin

BUT it doesn’t end there, you get rewarded with His reward - you inherit what He inherits because you are made an heir WITH Him who Hebrews 1:2 “in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world.”

ILLUSTRATE:

Friend who has rich parents but wont ask for money

POINT: CHRISTIAN’S have ALL things they need, available to them

PEACE - JOHN 14:27 ““Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.”

STRENGTH - 2 Cor 12:9-10 “And He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.”

JOY - John 15:11 ““These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.”

Apply: You have all that you need - look nowhere else for your souls greatest desire than to Jesus Christ

You have because you do not ask

CONCLUSION: (5 MIN)

“if indeed we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him.”

It is better understood as “because” rather than IF

When we come to faith in Christ - we hope and wait as joint heirs that we will be GLORIFIED w/ Christ even though we will be persecuted, mocked, laughed at for our relationship with Jesus.

But did you miss it, we will be GLORIFIED w/ CHRIST - what do we inherit? Eternal glory

John 17:22 ““The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one;”

What inheritance awaits us? One of glory and honor and majesty and beauty and perfection and harmony and communion

Look at your life - do you live for that?!

Us young people live for STUPID THINGS

Tik Tok

Big Muscles

Sex

Fun

Laughs

popularity

sports

And many of you here live for that because thats all you have - you will not inherit the KINGDOM & heaven and the presence of God in heaven because you don’t now Him and in-fact you hate Him so you will identify with foolishness and inherit the wages of your sin which is death, hell and torment!

But Christian - if glory is your inheritance ACT LIKE IT!

A prince who is about to inherit the throne will put on his best dress, he will prepare for the day that it happens

1 John 3:2-3 “Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is. And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.”

Will you prepare for an eternal life of holiness by using you remaining time for immorality. Flee from sin, live Holy!

LIVE IN LIGHT OF YOUR INHERITANCE