You are a child of God.
Dare 2 Share - Shhhhhh! I have some information that Satan would dearly love to keep away from you. In fact, I think that understanding and applying what I’m about to tell you is one of the most important principles in the Christian life. It affects your view of God, the image you have of yourself, and the way you treat others.
Enough of an introduction? Good- let’s get on with the particulars.
You are a child of God. I know, you probably already heard that. But I have a sneaking suspicion that you are not fully aware of all that means. Why? Because Scripture was written thousands of years ago, and to really ‘get’ what’s going on with the Bible, we need to ‘get’ what was going on at the time it was written.
Paul says that “Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family through Jesus Christ. (What pleasure he took in planning this!)” (Ephesians 1:5)
We read this verse and think of adoption in modern terms. Before we trusted Christ, we didn’t have a spiritual family. Then God came by the shelter and signed the papers, and now we have a sweet deal with Jesus and the rest of our heavenly homies…or something like that. Yet if you really study what Paul meant by the term ‘adoption’, you will discover that we have only scratched the surface. The key to understanding all this is found in Galatians 4:7:
Doesn't that privilege of intimate conversation with God make it plain that you are not a slave, but a child? And if you are a child, you're also an heir, with complete access to the inheritance.
In Roman times, slaves lived (mostly) in shame and fear. They were driven by their master, and their lives were miserable. They basically had no hope, unless something truly amazing happened.
And what would that be?
Adoption. In that culture, this was the best thing that could happen to a person. Imagine yourself, a slave with no future and no freedom- and one day a knock comes on your door. Expecting it to be another loudmouth drunken friend of your master, you slowly shuffle to the entrance and timidly greet the visitor.
Except the person looking at you is no one you have ever seen before. He is dressed in the finest of clothes, and bears a message for you!
The parchment shakes and tears fall from your eyes as you read the offer of adoption. You realize that your freedom from slavery has been bought and paid- and you now have a new father who will cherish your company as his own child as long as you live.
Not only that, you have an inheritance to all that the father owns. All your debts have been paid in full- you’re now an adrogatus (adopted one), and your life now belongs to a family that will love and care for you.
If you are a believer, that is your story as well. It’s not as if God signed some simple adoption papers, but He’ll never be you ‘real’ Dad, because Jesus is His ‘real’ Son. Quite the opposite actually. As an adrogatus, you are guaranteed your freedom from the slavery from shame, fear, and a destiny in hell. Not only that, but you now have full rights as a child of the King- which means that God really is your true Father, and Jesus really is your older brother. You have brothers and sisters all over the world who you will be with for eternity.
Want to hear the best part? In that culture, if you were adopted you could never be disowned by your father. A natural born son/daughter could, but not one who was brought into the family through adoption. That person was guaranteed a place at the family dinner table no matter what happened.
Why would Satan not want you to hear that? Because he’s your old master! He’s calling you right now back into a life of fear, shame, and slavery to bad choices. He wants you to think that your adoption is no big deal, and that your Father really doesn’t have time for you.
That’s a lie. The King of Glory has asked you to address Him as ‘Abba’ (in our words this would be something like ‘Daddy’, or ‘Papa’)…this was a term formerly used only by Jesus- but now it is our privilege as well.
You’re in the family my friend. Nothing you could ever do will make God love you more…or less for that matter!
I don’t know where you are in your relationship with God, but I would recommend that you meditate on this truth- and live out your status as an adrogatus!
Questions:
1) How are you still living as a ‘slave’ to your old life?
2) How does this information change your view of God, yourself, and others?
3) What is one way you can say ‘thanks’ to your Papa?
