Trinity Baptist Church

Key Words of the Christian Life

Adoption: Plenty of Room in the Family

Romans 8:15, 23, 9:4; Galatians 4:5; Ephesians 1:5

 

I have a riddle for you.  What do the following people have in common?

 

Eleanor Roosevelt, Art Linkletter, Snooki, Eric Clapton, Willie Nelson, Scott Hamilton, Colin Kaepernick, Edgar Allen Poe, President Bill Clinton, George Washington Carver, Dave Thomas (wendy’s), Aristotle, Eric Dickerson, Jesse Jackson, Nat King Cole, Jack Nicholson, Bo Diddley, Nelson Mandela, Nancy Reagan, Malcolm X, Moses and Jesus Christ

 

They were all adopted.

 

Many Christians don’t realize that adoption is a profoundly biblical concept and yet adoption is one of those key words of the Christian life.  Now even as I say that, I realize it is not a subject we talk about very much in church. In fact, we don’t even think about it from a biblical point of view. We don’t use it with anywhere near the frequency that we use salvation or redemption or justification.

 

It is a word that is used much more often in regard to physical relationships.  There are many people who are intimately acquainted with adoption. You may have been adopted, or you may have adopted a child yourself, or perhaps you were raised in a family that included adopted children. If any of those things is true about you, you probably have a better understanding of the biblical teaching than those who have never experienced adoption first hand.

Since it a word we don’t use often, let’s begin with

 

 

Adoption is the legal act of permanently placing a child with a parent or parents other than the birth parents.

 

Now several things happen simultaneously with the adoption.  Not only is the child placed in the custody of someone other than the birth parents, all parental responsibilities and rights of the biological parents cease to exist.  Those responsibilities and rights are given to the adoptive parents.

 

In fact, I helped a person recently who was trying to obtain his original birth certificate and it took a court order from a judge to unseal those records and make it available.

 

And once the adoption is finalized, there is no legal difference between biological and adopted children in most jurisdictions. 

 

Just to put it in simple terms, adoption means there is a person who is not a member of your family by birth that is brought into that family through a legal process with the result being there is now a new member of your family who is entitled to everything any other member of the family possesses.

 

Now biblically speaking, there are lots of places that speak of adoption.  And as we look at them, keep in mind, the meaning is much the same as it is in our culture with one primary exception:

 

In the New Testament, the word is used to describe how we are placed into God’s family with full family privileges as an adult member of the family.   That doesn’t happen in American adoptions.  A child must wait to come of legal age to enjoy adult privileges.  But that isn’t true in God’s family.

 

Now just so we can see the various texts, I want to read them to you, then we’ll zero in on one in particular.

 

Romans 8:15, 23, 9:3-5

 

Ephesians 1:1-6

 

There’s lots of good material for us to consider in those verses.  But I want to focus our thoughts on what Paul wrote in Galatians 4.  Now keep in mind, in this text, Paul is talking about how adoption places us into God’s family and gives us the privileges of a full-grown adult child.

 

Galatians 4:1-7

 

Verses one and two describe a common situation in the first century. Here we have a son whose father is extremely wealthy. One day the son will inherit the entire estate for himself. Under Roman law, because he is a minor child, being raised as a minor child, he is treated no differently than a slave. He is heir to all that his father owns, but while he is growing up he has no more rights than a slave does.

 

That means he is subject to guardians, nannies, babysitters, tutors, helpers, hired people and trustees who watch over him until the time set by his father.

He is an heir, but he is treated like a slave until the time his father decides to set him free.  It’s very much like being a teenager in America!

 

But beginning in verse 4 we are introduced to a contrast between that custom and being adopted into God’s family.

 

verses 4-5

 

Now some our word studies converge here.  We are sinners with no standing before God.  We have nothing to offer in and of ourselves.

 

But long before we showed up, God was at work.  That’s what verse 4 is telling us.  And at just the right moment in history, everything in God’s plan came together as Jesus offered Himself as a propitiation for our sins.  Through His sacrifice, God was satisfied. His anger was appeased

 

And on the cross, Jesus died to provide redemption for those under the law.  And in an amazing expression of His grace and mercy, God not only turned away His wrath and changed our standing from guilty to innocent, He adopted us into His family and gave us full adult rights as sons.

 

Then according to verse 6, God sent the Holy Spirit into our hearts to give us a constant reminder that we belong to Him.  It is that “still, small voice” of God that speaks to the soul and whispers, “You are now a child of God.” That same Holy Spirit within us cries out “Abba, Father.”

 

 

The word “Abba” comes from an Aramaic word that little children would use to speak to their fathers. It is an intimate, personal word of endearing affection. In English you might say “Dad” or “Daddy” or “Papa” or “Dear Father.” It’s a very tender way of talking to our Heavenly Father. No longer is He just the righteous judge of the universe who must condemn our sin.  He’s not even some distant God up in the sky who is uninterested in us.

 

He is my “Heavenly Daddy” who loves me and listens to me and cares for me.

 

In all the world there was only one person I called “Dad.” When my brother or I said, “Dad”, our father would turn and listen to our voices. The privilege of calling him “Dad” was given to us and only to us.

 

The same is true of my four sons. T.J., Micah, Caleb and Nathan are the only people in the world who have that unique relationship with me. I was one of my father’s two sons; I am the father to my four sons. They have a unique claim on me that other children don’t have.

 

So it is in the spiritual realm. If we know Jesus as Savior, God is now our Heavenly Father and we can come to him in prayer anytime, anywhere, for any reason, and he will never turn us away.

 

When we are in trouble, when the world has turned against us, when we are so discouraged that we feel like giving up, when we are confused about what to do next, the Holy Spirit whispers, “Talk to your Dad in heaven about it. He’s waiting to hear from you.”

The Spirit within us brings us back to our Father again and again and teaches us to say, “Abba, Father.”

 

Now it seems to me verse 5 is the heart of the passage.

 

The NIV uses, instead of the word adoption, the phrase “full rights of sons” to bring out the meaning.

 

The concept of “full rights” means that no matter how badly we may have sinned before conversion, no one is a second-class child in the family of God.

 

In the Jewish culture, when boys turn 12 they go through a ritual called a Bar Mitzvah in which they ceremonially become men.

 

You might say that when we come to Christ, we are “Bar Mitzvahed” into God’s family. We come in as grown-up, full members of the family with rights and privileges equal to those who have been there for 40 or 50 years. We can pray and claim God’s promises on the same basis as everyone else.

 

Suppose one of my boys does something wrong and later feels bad about it. So he comes to me and says, “Dad, I’m sorry for what I did and I’m going to try to do better in the future. I’m going to try to be more of a son to you from now on.”

 

If I were to hear those words, I’d say something like this, “Son, I love you and I’m glad you feel bad about what you did and I know you want to do better in the future. But I want you to know that no matter what you do, you could never be more of a son to me than you are right now.

Being my son has nothing to do with what you do or don’t do. You are my son by virtue of being a part of my family and nothing you do can ever change that fact.”

 

Now roll that around for a moment.  If one of my boys should rebel against all that I have taught him, and if he should move to some distant place and change his name so that no one will know he is my son, and if he should adopt some way of life that is far removed from what I believe is right, I will be heartbroken and perhaps I will be angry, but no matter what he does, he will always be my son and I will always love him.

 

I may have to preach their funeral before it’s all over with, but through a blood relationship, once a son, always a son. Nothing my boys can do can ever change that fact.

 

The same is true and even more so in our relationship with God. Our standing isn’t based on our performance. That’s good news because we all fail sooner or later. Our standing is based on God’s grace, which means it doesn’t depend on us. Every so often I hear someone question the blessed Bible doctrine of once saved, always saved.

 

If is even more secure than that.  It is “once a child of God, always a child of God” and nothing will ever change or alter that relationship.

 

We may do things that displease our Heavenly Father and we will. If we persist in disobedience, we will be disciplined by the Lord. But that discipline, painful though it may be, comes to us because we are God’s children. It is a mark of our salvation.

We are disciplined because we are the children of God, not in order to stay in God’s family. Our standing is secure because it is not based on our performance.

 

 

There is a beautiful illustration of adoption found in 2 Samuel 9.  It takes us back to the time when David was king of Israel.  One day, David is reminiscing about God’s blessing and his childhood and his mind comes to rest on his friend, Jonathan.

 

Jonathan was the son of King Saul and even though Saul and David had their share of difficulties, that friendship remained intact.

 

And David gets to wondering if there is anyone left from Saul’s family that he could show his appreciation and extend a kindness for the sake of Jonathan.

 

A servant named Ziba tells him one of Jonathan’s sons is still alive.  His name is Mephibosheth.  He lives in a place called Lodebar and he is crippled in both legs.  

 

David sends word for him to come to the palace.

 

Listen to the story.

 

2 Samuel 9:7-12

 

The story of Mephibosheth is our story.  We were crippled in sin.  The name “Lodebar” means to be without or have nothing.  That’s where we lived also.

And yet, God seeks to extend a kindness to us.  He invites us to come to his house, sit at his table and enjoy all the blessings of being a part of His family.

 

So where did Paul get his concept of adoption? Maybe he knew about Mephibosheth.  I think more likely his words and thoughts are influenced by the Roman culture around him.

 

When Paul talks about adoption, he is not referring back to the Old Testament. He is referring to the Roman law of his day.

 

Wealthy childless couples often practiced adoption to provide a legal heir for their wealth. They would adopt a slave and bring him into their family so that their wealth could be passed on to another generation.

 

Roman law included three key ingredients:

 

First, under Roman law, fathers had absolute right over their entire estate. They had rights over all that they owned, and their children were considered to be their personal property. In fact, a father in ancient Rome had the power of life and death over his children and in the early days of the Roman Empire, if a father wanted to put his children to death, he could legally do it and nobody could say anything to him about it.

 

So great was the power of a father under Roman law that the son would never be out from underneath his father’s authority as long as the father was alive. A son could be 70 years old and the father could be 93 years old, and under Roman law he was still under his father’s authority.

Second, if a son was adopted into a new family, he was guaranteed legal rights to his father’s property. That is always one of the questions if you have biological children as well as adopted children. How will it all work in terms of the family inheritance?

 

Roman law made it clear that an adopted child had exactly the same rights as all other children and no one could come before the adopted child–not the biological children and not other adopted children. He gained full inheritance rights with all the other children of the family.

 

Third, adoption not only gave you a new name and a new family, it also meant your old life was gone forever. So complete was the transformation that if you were adopted into a new family and you had old debts, at the moment of adoption all those old debts were canceled, wiped away forever. The adopted son in Rome was regarded as a new person, entering a brand-new life.

 

Scholars tell us that the adopted son went through a very serious and impressive ceremony. Because the father had absolute power in that situation, if the biological father was going to give up his son for adoption, the biological father would go into a public place carrying copper and scales.

 

He would three times go through an action that signified he was selling his son. The first time he would buy him back. The second time he would buy him back. The third time he would sell his son, but he wouldn’t buy him back. That would signify the father was giving up his absolute right over his son.

 

Then the adopted father would go before the magistrate and present papers proving he had the right to adopt the son.

 

In his commentary, William Barclay says,

 

“It is Paul’s picture that when a man became a Christian he entered into the very family of God. He does nothing to deserve it. God, the great Father, in his amazing love and mercy, has taken the lost, helpless, poverty-stricken, debt-ladened sinner and adopted him into his own family, so that the debts are canceled and the glory inherited.”

 

 

There is a logical question that arises when we speak of adoption in Biblical terms.  Doesn’t the Bible say we are born into God’s family?  If we are born again into the family of God, why do we need adoption?

Are we born again or are we adopted? The answer is yes.

 

Both are correct because we are both born again and adopted into God’s family. Here is the difference.

 

The new birth establishes a new relationship with God. That is why Jesus said to Nicodemus, “I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again”.

 

So with the new birth the emphasis is on how we get into God’s family.  We are helpless children who are born into the family only by the grace of God.

 

 

Adoption has to do with our place or standing or rights in the family.

 

We are born into Gods family through the new birth and through adoption we are immediately advanced to a state of full privilege and responsibility. From the moment of salvation God treats us as full adults, not as little kids.

 

When you graduate from a college or university, you receive a degree that is conferred with “all rights and privileges pertaining thereto.” It means that when you graduate, you get all the rights that go with having the degree.

 

When you become a citizen of the United States, you become a full citizen. There is no second class citizenship. If you are a citizen, you have the same rights any other citizen has. If you become a citizen, it doesn’t matter whether you were born in the United States or whether you are a naturalized citizen, by law the same rights apply to everyone. It is the same way in terms of adoption and the spiritual realm.

 

Think about what that guarantees us:

 

We are:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First, adoption means that you have a new family. The old family is gone forever. The old master is gone forever. The old name is gone forever. God is your Father, the Lord Jesus is your Savior, and the Holy Spirit lives within you.

 

Second, adoption means that you have a new privilege. You have the same right as the oldest saints of God. In our world there are exclusive clubs with members dependent on who you know and how much money you have. There is a children’s membership, a family membership, associate membership, blue-level membership, green-level membership, silver-level membership and for the hoity-toity people on the top, there is a gold-level membership.

 

 But God only has one level of membership. Everyone who comes into the family of God comes in the same way because the ground is level at the foot of the cross. He only has one class. Everyone in God’s family has gold card standing. Everyone is born again. Everyone has full rights. Everyone is at the head of the class. Everyone comes in at the best possible level.

 

3) Adoption means you have a new responsibility. What God says to any believer he says to every believer. The same Holy Spirit who is given to the gray-haired Christian is given to the new Christian. No one need feel like a second class citizen. No believer can use that as an excuse.

 

You can never say, “Well, I don’t want to read my Bible. I am just a new Christian.” That won’t wash with God. Nobody can say they can’t pray because they are just a new Christian. God will not accept that excuse. You can’t say you won’t testify for Christ because you have recently been born again and aren’t as good as those who have been saved for a long time. That is not a biblical thing to say because what God says to any of his children, he says to all his children. The responsibility that is laid on one is laid on all.

 

There are great advantages in being born again at an early age. If you have been saved for a long time, you ought to have a deeper understanding of God. You should be more skillful in walking by grace. But God does not give anything to the oldest saint of God that he doesn’t also give to the newest Christian. The moment you come to Jesus Christ, all the resources of heaven are put at your disposal.

 

What does all this mean?

 

 

 

Earthly adoption offers a wonderful picture of God’s gift to us because for adoption to happen, the parents must be willing to do it and they must be able to do it. They must choose to do it. To those of you who are adopted, God bless you. To those of you who have adopted children, God bless you. Thank you for modeling for us what God’s great love really looks like.

 

If they understand this truth, adopted children can say, “Someone must have loved me very much.” Adoption never just happens. There is no such thing as an accidental adoption. It takes trouble, time, expense, effort, sweat, heartache and tears.  Somebody has to open their heart and their home for children to be adopted.

 

In the very same way, biblical adoption is only possible because God is willing to add more children to his family. That is one of the sweetest thoughts I have ever come across.

 

On earth, adoption gives a child a new name, a new home, a new address, a new history and a new destiny. The same is true with God’s adoption. It gives the child of God a new name, a new home, a new address, a new history and a new destiny.

 

While researching the names of the adopted persons I shared at the beginning of this message, I came across the name of Leslie Lynch King, Jr.

Now chances are, you’ve never heard of Leslie Lynch, but in fact, he had the privilege of serving as president of the United States.  In fact, he was the only person ever to serve as vice-president and president without being elected by the electoral college.

 

You see, Leslie Lynch King, Jr., was, in fact, Gerald Rudolf Ford.  President Ford was born Leslie Lynch King Jr., on July 14, 1913 in Omaha, Nebraska.

His mother, Dorothy, separated from Leslie Lynch King, Sr. just sixteen days after her son's birth when the senior King threatened to kill his wife and infant son with a butcher knife.  Two years later, on February 1, 1916, Dorothy married Gerald Rudolff Ford, a salesman in a family-owned paint and varnish company. They then called her son Gerald Rudolff Ford Jr.

 

When I read that, I thought how much that described people in church all over the world.  They too were born the children of an evil and malicious dad who was out to kill them.  So they distanced themselves from him and took another name.  They identify themselves as Christians.  They’ve taken the name of Baptist or Methodist or Presbyterian, but the truth is, it was just a name change because they’ve never been adopted by God.

 

Brothers and sisters, God is given us the privilege and opportunity or not just distancing ourselves from the devil and changing our name, but of being added to the forever family of God.  And because of adoption, when we go to him, he always opens the door and says, “Welcome, my child. This is your home forever.”

Let’s pray.