Day 17: Pray, “Lord, Help Me Receive As a Son!”

Do you want to walk in all the benefits of your status as an adopted son or daughter of God? If so, you will need a deep revelation of how your adoption through Jesus makes you an heir of God.

I want to encourage you to walk in your royal identity as an heir of God today, and also provide you with a sample prayer to help you ask the Lord to show you the full results of your sonship. But first, our key passage for today comes from Galatians 4:4-7, which says:

“But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.

And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, Abba, Father!” Therefore you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ” (Galatians 4:4-7 NKJV).

These words leap off the page into my heart. Here’s why:

• The passage points out a fact we all know, but of which we also each need reminding: that God the Father is the One Who decided to send Jesus to earth to save us. It was His choice, because He is so good and generous and merciful.
• When the Father drew you and me each to Jesus and helped us yield to Him, making Jesus our personal Lord and Savior, in that moment in which you/I made Him our Savior, we also got adopted as the Father’s sons immediately. Yes, in that very moment. (And by the way, the word “sons” here is generic in the English language for sons or daughters, and I will continue to use it as such.)
• God put His Holy Spirit in our hearts to bear witness of our new sonship. Holy Spirit is now living within you, and He is crying out “Abba! Father!” through your heart, mind, soul, and spirit, and right into the ears of our Father God.
• Therefore, we can know for sure that we aren’t bound under the law as slaves, but are instead freely adopted by the Father as His beloved children.
• The law made us work and keep rules for everything, but grace means we receive a whole lot of things because Jesus deserves them, not because we deserve anything–and Jesus has decided to share those things with us.
• And since we are now His beloved children, that means that we have an inheritance–an inheritance which Jesus purchased for us with His blood.
• This makes you an heir of God, and it’s all by grace.

O beloved, we work too hard to receive what God provides by His grace.

I’m preaching to myself here also, just as much as I’m preaching to you. Because we always want to be diligent; that’s a good and holy thing. But too often, we look at our needs in life and think:

“I can’t do that because I don’t have the resources.”

And yet, we don’t have to have the resources in our own account.

We are heirs of God Himself. That means that, when Jesus died on the cross, even though He rose again, He still wrote His last will and testament and bequeathed all that He has to us. That is why Jesus said in Luke 12:32:

“Do not fear, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom” (Luke 12:32 NKJV).

And that’s also why we read in Psalm 84:

“For the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord will give grace and glory; no good thing will He withhold from those who walk uprightly” (Psalm 84:11 NKJV).

God wants to give us the Kingdom, and everything in it, because Jesus left it all to us as His last will and testament. We are God’s heirs, and Jesus purchased our right to inherit with His blood.

This means that we can receive from the Lord all that we need. And although we do have to meet His conditions and obey Him, seeking Him first and being diligent, He still gives us all these things by grace.

Sometimes I forget this, and I try to work and solve my own problems.

And even though we are commanded to work hard and be diligent, based on God’s Word, there is a fine line between diligent labor that honors God, as Colossians tells us to do:

“And whatever you do, do it heartily, as to the Lord and not to men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance; for you serve the Lord Christ” (Colossians 3:23-24 NKJV).

… and driving and striving and trying to do it all, and earn it all, ourselves.

Remember the sweet, grace-filled words of Psalm 127:

“Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it; unless the Lord guards the city, the watchman stays awake in vain. It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows; for so He gives His beloved sleep” (Psalm 127:1-2 NKJV).

O beloved. We need to believe God to give us a whole lot more, simply by His grace.

I hesitate to say this, because I really do see in daily life that laziness has become a habit ingrained in many Christians–and I do not ever want to give people a license to be lazy. God’s Word does not allow us to be lazy, if we are to obey that Word.

Therefore, if you are a person who happens to be lazy, please know that God cannot bless that behavior. Diligence leads to blessing, as we read so many places in the Bible, especially Proverbs 21:5:

“The plans of the diligent lead surely to plenty, but those of everyone who is hasty, surely to poverty” (Proverbs 21:5 NKJV).

But if you are not lazy at all, and you already are being diligent, then you already have that covered. (This message is for everyone, but we do all have to be diligent in order to really prosper.) And perhaps you needed to hear this today:

You are an heir of God: a beloved child of God and an heir (an inheritor) of all that He has.

And your inheritance was purchased for you by the blood of Jesus.

O beloved, I believe we all need to hear this message today. And we each, as individuals, need to pray:

“Lord, help me receive as a son!”

Do you need this right now? Do you need to get past the destructive habit of overworking, of trying to earn absolutely everything, and of only having the faith for what you can accomplish by works–by the sweat of your brow and the labor of your own two hands?

If so, then please pray this with me:

“Dear Heavenly Father, I come before You in Jesus’ name.

Abba Father, thank You for adopting me as your son. Thank You for sending Your precious Holy Spirit to live in me, and thank You for loving me, seeing me, and caring about my every need. I praise You for Your faithfulness, Your goodness, and Your generosity toward me.

Abba Father, in Jesus’ name, I need Your help today.

I have been striving so hard, working to accomplish all that needs to be done–but I have always come up short. I simply cannot work hard enough, labor long enough, or put in enough effort to do a fraction of what needs to happen, let alone to be blessed like Your Word says I can be blessed.

Therefore, Abba Father, I am imploring You for Your help today:

• Please increase my faith.
• I plead the blood of Jesus over everything that pertains to me. Please help me walk in all that Jesus purchased for me with His precious blood.
• Please fill me up once again, anew and afresh, with Your Holy Spirit of adoption. Help me to hear Him cry out “Abba, Father!” in my spirit, heart, mind, body, soul, and in all that I am.
• Help me to know You better than ever before as my Father, and to know Jesus as my Brother, Friend, and Savior more than ever before.
• And Father, please give me a revelation of all the benefits of my sonship in You.
• And Lord, please: help me to receive as a son!
• Help me to receive everything You have promised me by grace, because I am Your son; not just because of the labor of my hands.
• Help me to remain faithful to work as is pleasing to You, and to do everything You desire me to do. Don’t let me ever get lazy, and please deliver me from laziness if there is any of it in me now.
• But please help me to rest in You today and every day.
• Cover me with Your grace and mercy, and bring forth my complete and total inheritance this day, and every day, by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Abba Father, thank You for adopting me and making me Your child by Your grace.

Please help me to stand strong in faith, and I even pray that You would increase my faith. And please pour out all that You have on my head by Your grace, today and every day. Help me to notice the results of my prayers, and to notice and thank You for what You do for me by grace every single day.

Thank You, Abba Father. In Jesus’ name I pray, amen.”

O beloved, we need to learn to receive as sons.

You are the adopted child of God, beloved of the Father and cherished by our Lord Jesus and His precious Holy Spirit. And all of our labors could never earn us all that God has prescribed for us and promised us in His Word. Let’s look to Him and stand in our rightful, blood-bought position as heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ today, shall we?

If you needed to hear this message today, I invite you to leave a comment below and let me know.