To Be A Child Of God

Part 1

How To Become One

Rev. Walter M. Bosman Jr. ©2005

Last Sunday we took at look at freedom, but not just any freedom – rather, everlasting, eternal freedom We found that the only way to gain that freedom is to be a child of God. I bet that almost, if not every person here this morning has at some time or another heard someone say something like, “Oh well, aren’t we all children of God?” Or, “We’re all children of God anyway. So it doesn’t really matter what we say or do, right?” Usually these types of statements come up when discussing someone who is living a lifestyle or participating in some activity that is contrary to the will of God, as laid down in scripture. So the questions become, “Is it true that everyone is a child of God?”, “Are we born into the family of God?”. The answers to those questions, as found in scripture, may surprise you.

Let’s take a look and see what God has revealed to us about this through His Son, Jesus Christ. Jesus says:

If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and now am here. I have not come on my own; but He sent me. Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. You belong to your father, the Devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desire. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. He who belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God. (John 8:42-47) So Jesus is saying in these passages that there are those who are not children of God, but rather, they are children of the Devil. But how about us? Many, many people today like to think that we are each born as a child of God and only become children of the Devil after we have committed our first sin. This is the “people are basically good” mindset so prevalent today. Well, according to God’s word, those people are wrong. Scripture teaches that since the fall of Adam and Eve, all people are born with a sin-saturated nature. We are not sinners because we sin. We sin because we are sinners!”

Paul tells us in Romans 3:23, “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God!” Every human being is born not free, but rather as a slave to sin and Jesus says, “I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Now a slave has no place in the family, but a son (or daughter) belongs to it forever.” So the question is, “How do we, who have all been born out of the family of God as slaves to sin and its penalty of death, become children of God and be set free from our bondage?”

Well, there are only two ways that a person becomes someone’s child. The first way is to be born of and to that person. Problem is, there is only one begotten child of God and that is Jesus Christ. So the first way to become God’s child is closed to everyone else. That leaves the second way – that way being adoption.

One of the most interesting examples in all of history, with regard to adoption, has to do with the Roman Emperor Claudius and his adopted son, Nero. Claudius adopted Nero in order to set Nero up as Claudius’ successor as Emperor. In order to cement this alliance, Nero wished to marry Claudius’ daughter, Octavia. It was against Roman law for a brother and sister to marry. Even though Nero and Octavia were not blood-related in any sense, Roman law still recognized them as brother and sister. So before they could marry, the Roman Senate had to pass special legislation to allow the marriage to take place.

Adoption in Roman law was the legal action taken by a person in order to take into his family a child, who was not his own, for the purpose of giving him all of the privileges of a naturally born child. The adopted person lost all rights in his old family and gained all of the rights of a legitimate son in his new family. He got a new father. He became heir to his new father’s estate. He became co-heir with any natural sons born before or after his adoption. His old life was completely wiped out; it ceased to be a factor. For instance, all old debts were cancelled. He became a new person entering a new life.

It is the same for Christians. See, the only way to become an adopted son or daughter of God is by accepting Jesus Christ as your very own personal Savior and Lord. Jesus says:

I tell you the truth, no one can see the Kingdom of God unless he is born again. (John 3:3)

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)

Whoever believes in Him (Jesus) is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. (John 3:18)

He who does not honor the Son, does not honor the Father Who sent Him. (John 4:23b)

He who hate me hates my Father as well. (John 15:23)

I Am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. (John 14:6)

There it is. Our way to adoption by God the Father; the only way to adoption into everlasting life in God’s Kingdom, is through God-the- Son, Jesus Christ. It is not enough to simply “believe in God” as so many would like us to believe today. For the term “God” means many different things to many people. Ask a Hindu, Buddhist, Jew, Christian, Muslim, Christian Scientist, or any person following any religion in the world, who, or in some cases, what God is, and you will get a whole lot of different answers and definitions. Understand this and understand this well: all of them may be wrong, but because of diametrically opposite conditions inherent in their answers, it is impossible for them all to be right.

Personally, I am going to stake my eternity on God’s revelation concerning Himself in His Word, the Bible, and from His Son, Jesus Christ. God says that the only way to adoption is by accepting His Son, Jesus Christ, as personal Savior and Lord. If you have not done that, you are playing with eternal fire – literally, I might add.

Two things happen with regard to our eternal relationship to God’s family the moment we accept Christ as Savior and Lord. At that moment, the sinner, who is, as we learned earlier this morning, not a natural son or daughter of God, becomes positioned as child of God. This is just like a formal adoption and placing of a child in a new family. This is an act of God that places the new believer in God’s family as His child and grants that person all of the rights and privileges of that position.

At the same time as that placement happens, the new believer is spiritually born into God’s family. This “new birth” means we are as a child who needs to grow and develop. So while our position is one of full privileges in God’s family, our “practice”, however, involves our growth in grace and the knowledge of Jesus Christ. When a lost sinner becomes a Christian, he or she immediately enters into the family of God. Even though he or she does not deserve it, God in His amazing mercy, grace and love takes that helpless, lost and sin-debt ridden person and adopts him or her into God’s very own family, so that all sin-debt is cancelled and glory is inherited.

Again, Jesus told Nicodemus, “Truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” We all must be born anew into the family of God. There are no exceptions. This spiritual rebirth is a work of the Holy Spirit. It is indeed a work of regeneration. It is at that point that we become, spiritually speaking, as “little children”. It is this “rebirth” that John is speaking of in John 1:12-13, where John says, “But as many as received Him (Jesus), to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”

So, friends, what does our adoption by God teach us?

Since all that is true and Christ was raised from the dead to life and glory, we too shall be raised to life and glory for all eternity.

In conclusion, let me say that upon accepting Jesus Christ as your Savior and Lord, you are no longer a member of Satan’s family. You have a new Father, a new Head of the Family. You have a heavenly Father who loves you enough to have sacrificed His own Son’s life in order to save you personally. For we who have been adopted into God’s family, all of our sin-debt has been cancelled. The slate is wiped clean. We now have God as our Father and Jesus Christ as our Big Brother. What an honor and joy it is to be a member of this eternal family. Amen.

(Next week, in part 2, we will look at some of the promises made to the children of God.)