Daily Manna · Day 9 · January 9
No Longer Servants
“Wherefore thou art no more a servant, but a son; and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.”
Under Roman law, when a man was adopted as a son, he took a new family name and came under a new father, on the day the papers were witnessed. He might be a grown man. Nothing about his character had changed that morning, but his standing had changed completely.
Paul is writing to people who kept working like hired staff in their Father's house. You may know how that feels, because you have been living it. You answer quickly, stay late, and apologise twice. Underneath it all runs the fear that if you slip, the arrangement will end. Paul's argument is about legal standing, not about feelings: "the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all" (4:1). What happened to you was a change of family, and you did not win it in a good week. God made you a son and an heir. Then Paul says the frightening part. He is afraid these same believers are turning back "to the weak and beggarly elements," and he writes, "Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years" (4:9-10). A son can still live like a servant if he forgets who he is.
Father, I have been working hard for something I already have. I have kept paying on a debt You closed long ago. I can no longer tell my obedience from my anxiety, because from the inside they have felt the same for years. Teach me the difference, slowly if it has to be slow. I am Your child, and this is my Father's house. Help me believe that on Thursday afternoon, when nobody is watching and the old fear starts up again. Amen.
Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year two reading for day 9 is Who Shall Abide (Psalm 15:2).