Free as Sons

The adoption process is challenging on so many different levels. One of the most challenging things that my wife and I have found has been hearing how people talk about adoption. People can tell that my daughter and one of my sons have been adopted, and when we share their stories, people say, "Oh, that's so nice; now do you also have children of your own?" That's phrase number one not to say to an adoptive parent. I want to say, "Come in real close. I have a secret: they're ours!"

Other questions reveal a similar view of adoption. Some people wonder if we care about our children's heritage, and the very question implies that their heritage is thousands of miles away. But the reality is this: their heritage is here. Now that doesn't mean that Kazakhstan or China (the countries we have adopted from) are discounted altogether, or that a child who has lived in another country shouldn't have any 70appreciation for that country. But my son and daughter are Platts, not partly Platts, but fully Platts, with all the heritage that a Platt has. They're in our family in the same way as our other two sons.

Another comment we hear is, "I just don't know if I can love an adopted child like a biological child." There we go, using that distinction again. I guarantee you that the affection that my wife and I have for the children we have adopted is absolutely no different from our affection for the sons we had naturally. They're all our children.

These phrases, myths, and misconceptions about adoption are not just annoyances to parents who have been through the adoption process. They're symptoms of something deeper. They show how little we understand what it means to be a part of God's family. Even our infatuation with the "biological" and "adopted" labels and the distinction between the two shows our tendency to qualify children into categories based around flesh and blood. As long as that's the case, we'll struggle with a gospel that tells the story of a spiritual, transracial adoption that changes the lives of each of us for all eternity. We are adopted into the family of God, and the implications of this are huge for understanding and living out Christianity.

Salvation in Galatians

Salvation in Galatians

As we think through what Paul teaches about adoption in Galatians 3:26-4:7, it will be helpful to recap what he has said so far in this letter concerning justification. One statement really sums it up.

We Are Saved by Grace Alone through Faith Alone in Christ Alone

In Galatians 1 we saw that God's pleasure in us is not based on our performance for Him. We're not working to earn God's favor. That's legalism, and it's what Paul is addressing throughout Galatians. Legalism is working in our own power, according to our own rules, to earn God's favor. That's not the gospel.

We also want to avoid hypocrisy, that is, living lives that don't match the gospel we claim to believe. Paul confronts this error in Galatians 2. If we indeed trust and follow Christ, our lives will reflect His teachings as we are more and more conformed to His image.

We are saved through faith alone. God's pleasure in us is based on Christ's performance for us. We trust in Christ, and in so doing, we are accepted by God and alive to Him. As Paul says,

We are saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone.

In Galatians 3 Paul covers 2,000 years of Old Testament history, from Abraham through Moses to Christ. We saw that the climax of all history, not only biblical history, but all history, centers around Christ. The promise given to Abraham and the law given to Moses were both given to point us to Christ. Jesus fulfills the law of Moses, and Jesus completes the promise to Abraham. That's why salvation comes only through Christ.

Justification

The main doctrine we've seen in Galatians 1-3 is the doctrine of justification. In Galatians 2 we defined justification as the gracious act of God by which He declares a sinner righteous solely through faith in Jesus Christ. This is the doctrine, Luther said, upon which the church stands or falls (Sproul, Acts, 266). According to Calvin, it is "the hinge around which everything turns" (ibid., 66).

By grace through faith in Christ we are right before God the judge. Our righteousness doesn't have to be earned because Christ has earned it for us. He is our righteousness. Our righteousness is in heaven, and our standing before God is not based on the righteousness we can "work up" every day, but based solely on the righteousness of the One who sits at God's right hand.

Adoption

We cannot over-emphasize the importance of the doctrine of justification, for every follower of Christ needs a strong understanding of this biblical teaching. But justification is not the end of the gospel. In fact, it may not even be the greatest truth in the gospel. Here I want to borrow language from J. I. Packer's excellent book, Knowing God:

[Adoption] is the highest privilege that the gospel offers: higher even than justification. This may cause raising of eyebrows, for justification is the gift of God on which since Luther evangelicals have laid the greatest stress, and we are accustomed to say, almost without thinking, that free justification is God's supreme blessing to us sinners. 72Nonetheless, careful thought will show the truth of the statement we have just made.

That justification—by which we mean God's forgiveness of the past together with his acceptance for the future—is the primary and fundamental blessing of the gospel is not in question. Justification is the primary blessing, because it meets our primary spiritual need. We all stand by nature under God's judgment; his law condemns us, guilt gnaws at us, making us restless, miserable, and in our lucid moments afraid; we have no peace in ourselves because we have no peace with our Maker. So we need the forgiveness of our sins, and assurance of a restored relationship with God, more than we need anything else in the world; and this the gospel offers us before it offers us anything else.

... But this is not to say that justification is the highest blessing of the gospel. Adoption is higher, because of the richer relationship with God that it involves. (Packer, Knowing God, 206-7)

Packer goes on to explain why adoption is a higher blessing than justification. The doctrine of justification makes us right before God the judge, but in the doctrine of adoption we are loved by God the Father. In justification, the picture is legal; we stand before a judge who makes a pronouncement. But in adoption, the judge not only declares you "Not guilty," but He also gets up off the bench, comes down to where you are, takes your chains off of you, and He says, "Come home with Me as My son." Packer says, "To be right with God the Judge is a great thing, but to be loved and cared for by God the Father is a greater" (ibid.). That's the truth we need to contemplate in this next section of Galatians: the idea that you and I are loved by God the Father. In answer to the question, "What is a Christian?" Packer says, "The richest answer I know is that a Christian is one who has God as Father" (ibid., 200). He continues,

If you want to judge how well a person understands Christianity, find out how much he makes of the thought of being God's child, and having God as his Father. If this is not the thought that prompts and controls his worship and prayers and his whole outlook on life, it means that he does not understand Christianity very well at all. (ibid., 201)

73The church should be a people whose worship and prayers and outlook on life are all prompted and controlled by the fact that we are children of God.

The Adoptive Father

The Adoptive Father

Galatians 3:26 is a summary statement of everything we have seen up to this point in Galatians: "For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus." Notice that Paul doesn't say "sons and daughters" or "children" here—he purposely calls God's people "sons." This is not an attempt to be chauvinistic. Elsewhere God refers to His people as sons and daughters (see Isa 43:6) and children (Ezek 16:21). In light of Galatians 4:1-5 we can see that Paul is actually contrasting "sons" with "children." Understanding the background for these verses is important for seeing the significance of sonship.

There's debate over what Paul is referring to in 4:1-5, whether he's alluding to Jewish, Greek, or Roman customs concerning slaves and guardians. Regardless of which of these cultures is in view, each culture had a time during which a boy, even though he was an heir in the family, would basically be treated like a slave. At a certain age the individual's status would change, and he would take on the responsibilities of manhood. He would officially pass from being a child—like a servant—to a son.

But Paul did not speak of "sons and daughters" in this illustration because inheritance in that day was reserved for sons, not daughters. Still, the Bible is not being chauvinistic here; Paul was actually being very counter-cultural for his day. According to 3:28 the full rights of a son, including the full inheritance, are granted to all who belong to Christ, regardless of whether they are male or female.

Paul takes the illustration of what happens when someone receives the full rights of a son in adoption, and he uses it to describe what God does in our lives by grace through faith in Christ.

There are two actions—radical, glorious actions—God takes to adopt us as sons.

God Sent His Son So That We Might Receive the Position of Sons

Galatians says, "When the time came to completion, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons" (4:4-5). The word for adoption 74specifically means, "to place someone as an adult son." God adopts us as sons by sending His Son. That leads to the question, What is it about God sending His Son that makes it possible for us to be adopted as His sons? The contemporary analogy of adoption, though it's not precisely the same as adoption in Paul's first-century context, will hopefully help illustrate the Bible's answer to that question.

Consider the following conditions that must be met if you want to adopt a child today.

Adoption requires someone who comes at the right time. Anyone who's been through an adoption process knows the grueling pain of waiting and waiting, getting tons of forms together. You'd think it'd be as easy as connecting an orphan with a willing parent, but there's so much more that goes into it. In the same way, God sending His Son to this earth when He did was not an accident. Paul says that God sent His Son "when the time came to completion" (4:4). This is such a great Christmas text because it points to the significance not only of what happened 2,000 years ago when Jesus was born, but also why it happened at that time. The timing was intentional in every way.

When God sent His Son, it was the right time theologically. Everything that was going on in the Old Testament was leading up to this point. The promise to Abraham had been given, the law of Moses had done its work to drive men to anticipate Christ, and over 300 prophecies had been given, all of it aimed toward this time. Christmas didn't just happen. It was the culmination of a plan devised in the eternal counsel of God before the creation of the world (Eph 1:4).

Also, it was the right time religiously. The paganism of ancient Rome and the idolatry that pervaded the Roman empire had taken the culture of Jesus' day to new lows. Spiritual hunger was not just evident among the Jewish people who were longing for a Messiah (though they didn't realize what was coming), but a spiritual hunger dominated the Roman cultural landscape as well.

Two other factors indicate that the timing for Christ's coming was right. It was the right time culturally. The Greek language had become common and practically universal, thus allowing for the spread of the gospel more easily across the known world.

Finally, it was the right time politically. The Pax Romana, or Roman peace, prevailed. Rome had conquered and subdued surrounding nations, and as a result it built roads permitting travel and commerce to flourish. It would be much easier to take the gospel to the far corners 75of the world in such conditions. (On the timing of Christ's coming, see Stott, Message of Galatians, 105-6; Ryken, Galatians, 160).

When we think of the timing of these events, we shouldn't imagine that God was sitting in heaven thinking, Things are lining up well; this seems like a good time to send My Son. No, God in His sovereignty was designing all of history for this moment in time. It was an appointment. Likewise, God has another appointment for Christ's return, and that won't be by accident either. God, in His sovereign design, has ordained a time when Jesus will come back. Revelation 22:20 says, "He who testifies about these things says, 'Yes, I am coming quickly.'"

Adoption requires someone who possesses the right qualifications, in addition to the right timing.4 In order to go through a contemporary adoption process, you have to go through screenings, fingerprint tests, background studies, and home studies, all in order to fit the qualifications. My wife and I couldn't adopt from one particular country because we weren't old enough, and for a while we couldn't adopt from any country because we didn't have a home due to Hurricane Katrina. There were numerous qualifications we had to meet. In a much deeper way, adoption into God's family requires the right qualifications. For instance, who can pay the price for sinners to be saved? That question points to only one possible person in history: Jesus. And what are His qualifications?

Jesus is fully divine. "God sent His Son," the One Colossians 1:15 says is "the image of the invisible God." Jesus is not just a divine surrogate. He is, in the words of Philippians 2:6, "in the form of God." God did not create His Son; He sent His Son, the pre-existent, fully divine, infinite Son of God, who alone can bear the infinite wrath of God.

Jesus is fully human. "God sent His Son," Paul tells us, and He was "born of a woman" (Gal 4:4). Paul makes the same point in the midst of Philippians 2:5-11, a passage that is theologically packed. Here's how the apostle refers to Christ:

Paul's reference to Christ's "external form" should not be taken to mean that Jesus only appeared to be human. Rather, Paul is referring to the fact that Christ had a physical body like all men. Jesus was both fully divine and fully human.

Christ had a normal birth, complete with a dingy manger and soiled swaddling clothes, as any other poor peasant in Palestine would have had. Luther said Christianity "does not begin at the top, as all other religions do; it begins at the bottom" (Luther, Lectures on Galatians, 26:30). He continues,

you must run directly to the manger and the mother's womb, embrace this Infant and Virgin's Child in your arms, and look at Him—born, being nursed, growing up, going about in human society, teaching, dying, rising again, ascending above all the heavens, and having authority over all things. (ibid.)

Jesus is fully righteous. Not only was He "born of a woman," but also He was "born under the law" (Gal 4:4). Jesus was born not simply a man, but more specifically a Jewish man who grew up in a Jewish home, attending the Jewish synagogue. He perfectly fulfilled all the demands of the law of God. If Jesus had not been righteous, He would not have been able to redeem unrighteous men.

Adoption requires someone who comes at the right time and someone who has the right qualifications. There's one more requirement that should be mentioned:

Adoption requires someone who has the right resolve. You don't adopt accidentally; you adopt purposefully.

Jesus came with a purpose: God sent His Son "to redeem those under law, so that we might receive adoption as sons" (4:5). He determined to redeem us. Here's how Paul puts it:

As a parent takes the initiative to seek out and adopt a child, so it was God's pleasure and will before the creation of the world to set His affections on us. But there's a big difference between a contemporary story of earthly adoption and the biblical story of spiritual adoption. Earthly adoption is often glamorized, even over-glamorized, as we think about sweet, precious, innocent children all over the world just waiting to be adopted by a family. But when you look at Ephesians 2, the people who are adopted are objects of wrath who follow the ruler of this world, Satan, gratifying the cravings of their sinful nature (Eph 2:1-3). Russell Moore, himself an adoptive parent, makes the following analogy with respect to the contemporary picture of adoption:

Imagine for a moment that you're adopting a child. As you meet with the social worker in the last stage of the process, you're told that this 12-year-old has been in and out of psychotherapy since he was three. He persists in burning things, and attempting repeatedly to skin animals alive. He "acts out sexually," the social worker says, although she doesn't really fill you in on what that means. She continues with a little family history. This boy's father, grandfather, great-grandfather, and great-great-grandfather all had histories of violence, ranging from spousal abuse to serial murder. Each of them ended their own lives. Think for a minute. Would you want this child? If you did adopt him, wouldn't you watch nervously as he played with your other children? Would you watch him nervously as he looks at the knife on the kitchen table? Would you leave the room as he watched a movie on TV with your daughter, with the lights out? (Moore, Adopted for Life, 29)

Then Moore identifies this potentially problematic 12-year-old: "He's you. And he's me. That's what the Gospel is telling us" (ibid.). Praise God that though there was nothing in us to draw Him to us, God determined to redeem us. And lest that sound like an exaggeration of our evil and sinfulness, look at the cross. Look at the picture of God's wrath against sin. It was no minor offense for which Jesus died.

Jesus determined to redeem us, and He died to rescue us. Praise God for His resolve. The other day I was playing with my son whom we 78adopted from Kazakhstan, and his favorite question now is "Why?" When I told him I loved him, he asked, "Why?" I said, "'Cause you're my son." And, of course, he asked, "Why?" How do you answer that? Out of all the children in all the world, why is he my son? I started thinking about all the factors that had to come together, from the timing to the qualifications, to the ups and downs and the days my wife and I wondered if we could do this. I felt the tears well up, though my son didn't even know what was going on (probably sorry that he asked why). I looked at this precious little boy and I said, "Because we wanted you, buddy. And we came to get you. That's why you're my son." In a much greater way, you and I have a God who says, "I love you." And when we ask, "Why, God?" He answers, "Because you're My son." "But why?" "Because I wanted you," He says, "and I came to get you." Praise God that He sent His Son so that we might receive the position of sons.

As great as the reality of being a son is, the gospel could stop there and we would fall to our knees in worship, but there's more good news. The gospel doesn't just declare us "justified," nor does it only give us a new position, a new status. Paul tells us about another blessing: "And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba, Father!'" (Gal 4:6).

God Sent His Spirit So That We Might Experience the Privileges of Sonship

Once you adopt a child, he or she takes a new position in the family, but this is not where the story stops. This is where the story really gets good, which is why we can't be satisfied with an I-prayed-a-prayer-however-many-years-ago kind of Christianity. There is so much more! My children know that I'm their father and they're my children, not only because of the love we showed them by traveling to the other side of the world to adopt them, but because of the love I show them today. Their status is based on what a judge in their country declared years ago, but their life is based on our relationship every day as we play cars and read books and run around the yard and go to Moe's for dinner and sing songs on the way home.

So too with God! Your status with Him was settled on the day you were declared righteous through faith in Christ. But there is more here than simply a change in status. You have new life, a living relationship with God in which He communes with you and sustains you on a daily basis with love, affection, and strength. Coming to Christ changes who we are.

79We live with a new identity before God. In the words of Galatians 3:27, we are "baptized into Christ." This is a picture of immersion into the life of Christ; it's what water baptism symbolizes and signifies. This was huge in context when we remember that Paul was addressing Judaizers—those who were saying that you needed to be circumcised in order to be saved. Paul talks about the picture of baptism, which in certain ways replaced circumcision as the identifying marker of the Christian, though Paul is in no way saying that you must be baptized in order to be saved. Instead, baptism is an outward picture of an inward reality, the reality of experiencing a transforming identification with Christ. Nevertheless, baptism is not just an optional thing to consider: if you are a follower of Christ, this is an extremely important step of obedience as the picture of your identification with Christ. Again, it's not necessary in order to be saved, but it is a fruit of obedience commanded by God.

And as we are baptized into Christ, Paul says we are clothed with Christ. Notice the imagery here, for Paul speaks of putting on Christ "like a garment" (3:27). In Old Testament culture, when you passed from childhood into manhood and received your full rights as a son, you would literally put on different clothes. Likewise, our old self in Adam is removed and discarded when we become new by faith in Christ. This is what happens when we are united to Him.

Not only are believers united to Christ, but also we are united in Christ. In verse 28 Paul starts listing some of the barriers that separated people in the first century, and these are barriers that still separate people today. He starts with ethnic or racial barriers, Jews and Greeks. Then he moves to social barriers, slave or free. Finally, Paul talks about the gender barriers of male and female. Paul is not saying that when you come to Christ you lose these distinctions, that you're no longer a Jew or a Greek, slave or free, male or female. Instead, he's saying that these barriers no longer divide because we are all one in Christ Jesus. Oh, this is the beauty of the church summed up in one verse: a people united not by their ethnicity, their socioeconomic status or gender, not by this or that artificial distinction set up in a particular culture or society, but a people from all ethnicities, socioeconomic statuses, and genders united together as one in Christ. We all stand before God the same, needing Christ, dependent on Christ, not one of us better or worse. All of us need grace, and we find it in Christ alone, through whom we have all become sons of God!

80Experiencing unity in Christ is one of the great joys of traveling to other countries and meeting with believers there. For instance, when you sit down with Christians in India, there are so many differences that would separate you: you eat differently, you speak different languages, you have different political viewpoints, and you approach life differently. Yet, you immediately have a bond in Christ, and it's a beautiful bond that transcends any differences. It's not a socially, politically, or economically manufactured unity; rather, it's a unity that comes from each person being in Christ. Union with Christ automatically establishes communion with other Christians.

Finally, in addition to being baptized into Christ, clothed with Christ, and united in Christ, we each belong to Christ. In 3:29 Paul says, "And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed." Here Paul takes this unity and ties it to the Old Testament line of saints. We belong to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Joshua, Samuel, David, Solomon, Isaiah, and Jeremiah. We all belong to Christ.

We saw previously that because we've been adopted, we live with a new identity before God. There is a second blessing we should mention.

We enjoy intimacy with God. The Spirit transforms not only our identity, but also our intimacy with God. Paul says, "And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba, Father!'" (4:6). Remember the context of what Paul has developed up to this point. At the end of chapter 3 and into the beginning of chapter 4, Paul built the case that we were once held captive by God's law. Apart from Christ, we were held prisoners by the law, locked up in our sin (3:23). The commands of God condemned us because we could not keep them. Paul says, "In the same way we also, when we were children, were in slavery under the elemental forces of the world" (4:3). We were held captive by the law; but now, everything has changed.

Though we were previously imprisoned by the law God gave as a result of sin, now we're captivated by His love. Our situation under the new covenant in Christ is much different from the situation of believers under the old covenant. Consider the fear and trembling associated with the giving of the law in Exodus 19:9-22. The people were warned, "Anyone who touches the mountain will be put to death" (v. 12). In the morning, "there was thunder and lightning, a thick cloud on the mountain, and a loud trumpet sound, so that all the people in the camp shuddered" (v. 16). The mountain was "completely enveloped in smoke" and it "shook violently" (v. 18). After that encounter, the people begged 81Moses, "You speak to us, and we will listen, ... but don't let God speak to us, or we will die" (Exod 20:19).

This is a picture of the effect of the law. The law revealed man's sin and separation from God, such that in the Old Testament, men trembled at the thought of being anywhere near God. Now take that image and bring it into the New Testament, specifically to the picture of adoption in Galatians 3-4. The people of God were awed and frightened at the prospect of approaching God under the law in the Old Testament, and rightfully so; yet this is the privilege of every single person who is united to Christ. You and I approach God, the same God of Exodus 19, and we do so with "boldness and confident access through faith in Him" (Eph 3:12). And not only do we have confidence, but we also have intimacy: we cry out, "Abba, Father" (Gal 4:6).

This word Abba is sometimes misunderstood and over-sentimentalized as a word that simply means "Daddy," which gives the impression that this is almost like baby talk. But that's not how Scripture uses this title for God. This is a groaning, a longing for a father. It's Jesus in the garden, crying out (Mark 14:36). Likewise, the same Spirit in us cries out, "Abba, Father" (Rom 8:15). It's my son, when he's scared, and he grabs on tight to my neck, and he cries out, "Daddy!" It's when you hear the news you feared, you get the diagnosis you dreaded most, you experience the circumstances you never could have imagined happening, and you fall on your knees and cry out, "Abba, Father!" For even in those moments, you do not have a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear (Rom 8:15). No matter what this world brings, you have nothing to fear because you have received the spirit of sonship, leading us to cry out, "Abba, Father!"

Do we realize that the privilege of approaching God, which was once reserved only for Moses in the Old Testament, is now what happens when you do something as simple as bowing your head before a meal? It's good to be a son, to enjoy intimacy with God. And the Judaizers were missing it, just as many professing Christians today are missing it. They've got the religious routine down, but they have no intimacy with God.

The conversion of the well-known eighteenth-century evangelist John Wesley is a perfect example. Wesley was an honor graduate of Oxford University, an ordained clergyman in the Church of England, and orthodox in his theology. He was active in practical good works, regularly visiting the inmates of prisons and workhouses in London and 82helping distribute food and clothing to slum children and orphans. He studied the Bible diligently and attended numerous Sunday services as well as various other services during the week. He generously gave offerings to the church and alms to the poor. He prayed and fasted and lived an exemplary moral life. He even spent several years as a missionary to American Indians in what was then the British colony of Georgia. Yet upon returning to England he confessed in his journal, "I who went to America to convert others was never myself converted to God." Later reflecting on his preconversion condition, he said, "I had even then the faith of a servant, though not that of a son" (Stott, Message of Galatians, 109).

Are you a son? I'm not asking whether you go to church, read your Bible, or raise your kids a certain way. But do you have intimacy with God as Father? This is what it means to be a son.

Finally, we are guaranteed an inheritance from God. The argument keeps building: you are no longer a slave, Paul says, but a son, and because you are a son, you receive the inheritance. Our salvation and the gospel become more beautiful as you dive deeper into them. We've gone from justification, which means being right before God the judge; to becoming sons, which means we have a new identity and enjoy a new intimacy; and now, since we are sons, God has also made us heirs.

We have been adopted, and the blessings we receive are staggering. Three blessings in particular are worth mentioning. First, we have an eternal Father. Some people have never really had a father in their lives, while others have had great fathers who have pointed to a heavenly Father. But even the best earthly father is an inadequate picture of God as our Father and of our spiritual adoption. For example, some say that children who were adopted have a more difficult time with their identity in a family. I want to be a good father to my children, for them to know every day that they are fully in my family and that I am here to stay as their father. I want them to be secure in my love. On a much grander scale, this is what God does in adoption. He assures us of His love. Even when we fall, He is our Father. This is good news for those who have fallen prey to sin. Like any good father, God may discipline us, but He will do it because He has deep love and affection for us.

Second, our adoption by God means that we have an eternal family. We've already seen in 3:28 that in Christ we have union with one another. As those in God's family, we relate to one another as brothers and sisters. Amazingly, Romans 8:17 says that we are "coheirs with Christ," and 83elsewhere we are told that we are brothers with Jesus (Heb 2:11). He is our elder brother, though not in a way that compromises His divinity, as some cults believe. We are not equal to Jesus. But Scripture does teach that everything that belongs to Jesus belongs to us as coheirs. Now that's good news and bad news. It's bad news because Jesus suffered, and the world hated Him. Therefore, being in the family with Jesus may cost us our lives. But it's also good news because if we share in His sufferings, we will also share in His glory (Rom 8:17). Together, we will enjoy all that Christ has for all of eternity. This is a good family, one that you want to be adopted into.

Third, in addition to having an eternal Father and an eternal family, we have an eternal home. When you're brought into a new home and the adoption is complete, it's not temporary.

Nobody's coming to my house from Kazakhstan or China to take my children away—nobody. You and I can have the same firm confidence based on the authority of God's Word that we will always belong to Him. God has sent His Son into the world that we might receive the position of sons. And when we trust in Christ for salvation, God takes us into His home as heirs, and nobody's taking us away—nobody.

Isn't it indescribably glorious to be adopted by God?

Reflect and Discuss

Reflect and Discuss

1. What's the difference between being justified and being adopted?
2. What does the timing of Christ's coming teach you about God's providence in the world and in redemption? Did Jesus come at just the right time? Explain.
3. Could anyone other than Jesus have reconciled us to God? Explain your answer.
4. How might seeing one's fundamental identity as biological undermine the gospel? Why would this have been a strong temptation for Jews in Paul's day?
5. Identify the problem with the following statement: "God adopts us because we deserve a better life."
6. How should the new identity of a follower of Christ affect his or her battle with sin? What about fear? Covetousness? Divisiveness? Why should the doctrine of adoption inspire greater prayer and deeper worship?
7. How would you respond to someone who said that God is the Father of everyone, regardless of their faith?
8. 84Does intimacy with God as your Father naturally lead to a low or irreverent view of God? Explain.
9. How should the doctrine of adoption impact the way we view others in the church? Do you think most people in your church view the church as a family, an event, or a building? Why?
10. Paul speaks of the inheritance believers receive by virtue of their adoption. List some of these privileges.