The Paper That Changed Everything

In 2019, a ten-year-old boy named Michael sat in a courtroom in Grand Rapids, Michigan, wearing a clip-on tie his foster mother had bought him that morning. For three years, he had moved between four different homes, carrying his belongings in a black garbage bag. He had learned not to unpack completely — because leaving was always easier when you traveled light.

But that Tuesday, Judge Patricia Gardner signed the final adoption decree, and Michael's foster parents became his forever parents. His new father, David, knelt down in the hallway afterward and said something Michael would never forget: "You don't have to keep that garbage bag anymore. Everything I have is yours — the house, the family name, all of it."

Michael broke down crying. Not because he was sad, but because for the first time, he believed it was permanent.

Paul tells the Roman believers something even more staggering in Romans 8:15-17. We have not received a spirit of slavery that pulls us back into fear — that old anxiety of being sent away, of never quite belonging. Instead, the Spirit of the Almighty moves within us, teaching our hearts to cry out "Abba, Father" with the unguarded trust of a child who knows he is home for good.

And the inheritance that follows is beyond comprehension: we are co-heirs with Christ. Everything the Father has belongs to His children. You can unpack your bags. You are staying.