Children of God

Texts:  Luke 3:21,22; Galatians 3:26-4:7

Pastor Phil Hughes, American Fork Presbyterian Church, UT

June 11, 2023

The name of our sermon series on Galatians is “Living by Grace” because the main message of this New Testament letter is that we are not made right with God by our works and accomplishments, but by God’s grace which is ours to receive because of what he has done for us in Christ.

Grace is free.  We don’t earn it or work for it.  And it is by grace that we are made children of God

We have received adoption as children of God and when you are adopted you don’t have to work to be in the family.  Slaves in ancient culture had to work for their place in a household.  But sons and daughters are freely accepted. It happens by the will of the parents.  It is the will of God, our Father, to adopt us into his family.

That’s kind of the big idea of the passage before us today.

My biological mother made the loving, courageous, and hopeful decision to carry and give birth to me though she was single, away from her own family, and who knows what else.  I was adopted at birth by my family.  My parents never said I had to work to be considered their child.  I was never treated less. I was always told I was chosen out of love and that gives me security to this day.

We are adopted by God our Father.  We are adopted out of love and made his children.

Three things about being children of God here in this passage in Galatians:

Children of God are baptized.

Children of God put on Christ.

Children of God lose their identity in someone greater than themselves.

First, children of God are baptized. Baptism is kind of like our adoption papers.  Paul writes that we are children of God by faith because of our baptism.

Baptism is the natural step for the Christian.  Those who profess faith in Christ are to be baptized, not as a legalistic act but as an act of committed love and belonging. It goes with our faith.

Jesus was baptized. We follow his example.  Jesus said that those who want to be his disciples are to be baptized. The New Testament assumes that a person who has faith in Christ is baptized.  It is never spoken of as an option. Baptism unites us to the Lord Jesus Christ. It signifies our birth as his child, among other meanings.

Second, being a child of God means we are clothed with Christ. Paul says that when we are baptized we are clothed with Christ. In the ancient church, when a new Christian was baptized he or she would take off their clothes, symbolizing them taking off their old way of life.  They would be baptized, and then given a white robe to put on symbolizing their new life as a worshipper of Christ.

In Roman society when a young boy grew into his teens, a sacred ceremony was held where he took off the toga that he as a boy would wear, and he would put on a toga that an adult wore.  It was, in essence, a secular rite of passage into adulthood. When a slave was adopted by a family, which did happen at times, the slave was presented with a white robe to signify that he was now a part of the family.[1]

When we are baptized it is like taking off an old life and putting on a new life. The Bible also speaks about baptism as a dying and a rising. We are clothed in Christ and we have a new status as a son or daughter of God.  We are called to become mature and to grow up into Christ.  We are to “wear” a different life, if you would.

In Colossians Paul writes about this.  He says “for you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.”[2]  You might say our life is spiritually submerged in a greater life. Then he says to “clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.  Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone.  Forgive as the Lord forgave you.  And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.”[3]

In those words Paul is describing “the wardrobe”, you might say, of the children of God. He is describing the clothes a child of God wears. We dress up in Christ.

When I was a child I loved Batman.  I never missed the old television show.  I would dress as Batman.  I wanted to be like Batman.  I had a Batman mask, a Batman cape.  I had a little car that I could pedal that I called the Batmobile. I wanted to look like Batman. I did this to put my identity in Batman.

At sporting events, people dress in the garb of their team.  They will wear jerseys, shirts, hats.  Some people get a little wild coloring their hair, painting their faces, or wearing other paraphernalia or ostentatious jewelry.  They do it to show their devotion, who they identify with, and their passion.

As children of God we are to dress-up in Christ.  We are to wear the things of Christ.  In a world that lives for self-expression we want to live for Jesus-expression. In a time when we “identify” this way or that way, people of faith identify “in Christ.”  Everything is subservient to that.

Which leads to the third thing about being a child of God. Paul says as children of God who are baptized and put on Christ, our identity is now swallowed up by Someone bigger. Our lives are in someone else.  Again, I use the term spiritually submerged in Jesus Christ.

Paul writes that there is no longer Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female.  The divisions of race, rank and class status, and gender are obliterated.  In the churches of Galatia and the New Testament those were the types of people who made up the congregations.  Paul reminds them that as children of God, the family of God doesn’t go by the divisions. So there is no longer Jews and Greeks, slaves and free, males and females.

So in our churches today, we know who is a male and who is a female.  We know who is from this culture and that culture. We might know who comes from a long line of religious background and those who don’t. But we are first identified and defined as a Christian before anything else.  We are one in Christ and belong to Christ.

Our lives are in someone else.  Someone bigger than our role in life, our gender, our cultural background.

We have to be careful in churches that we don’t categorize people.  Yes, we know and celebrate the uniqueness and gifts and peculiarities of each person.  But first and foremost we are all sons and daughters of God.

In Paul’s world only the son received the inheritance, which is why he speaks in masculine terms.  But he points out here that the children of God includes both male and female.  In fact, that is one of the beautiful things about baptism.  Under law and in Judaism, it was circumcision that identified someone as a Jew and in line with Abraham.  Obviously, that excludes females.  Baptism is for both male and female.  It includes all.

In one of the ancient morning prayers that a Jewish man would pray each day he would bless and thank God for not making him a foreigner or non-Jew, for not making him a slave, and lastly, not make him a woman.[4]  Perhaps Paul is responding to that prayer, which previously being a devout Jew he would have been very familiar with.

Paul does this to show that there is a new reality in Christ.  It no longer matters what our race, background or sex.  We are defined first and foremost by our relationship to the Lord Jesus Christ. This is who we are and how we need to see one another.

We are all one because we are all in debt to God for his grace.  We are all sinners saved by the cross, which reduces us all to the same and lowest common denominator.  God’s mercy is just as needed for the Jew as for the Gentile, for the slave as for the free, for the male as for the female. It is just as needed for the person who has been in the church all their lives and the person who is brand new to faith.

We live in a world that constantly compares people.  I admit that I sometimes get caught in this.  I compare myself to someone else and think I am better, or not as good.  The world of Facebook and social media has amplified this a thousand times. When we start comparing we define people by distinctions and deny the oneness in Christ.

We say that person is intelligent and that one not so much.  That person is successful and that one less successful.  That person is really engaging and attractive.  That person not so much.  Or we compare ourselves to people and figure we aren’t as intelligent, or successful, or engaging, or attractive, or good.  But this is not the love of God.[5]

Within the body of Christ, the family of faith, there is no room for comparison because comparison only accentuates differences.  We may have different gifts and roles, strength of faith and personalities, but we are all one in Christ.  We are all loved by our Father equally and all saved by grace. Grace appreciates each other for our differences, When it comes to standing before God and receiving his love, we all are on the same level.

We belong to Christ. We are now in his possession.  We don’t even belong to religion.  We belong to Christ.

Remember that Paul had been writing how the law had been a guardian and disciplinarian.  The guardian was that household servant figure who was a taskmaster at making sure the son was delivered each and every day to his teacher to receive his education.  The child had to be watched and kind of manhandled.  When we finally came to Christ, we were no longer under that old taskmaster, but now under grace.

The law was like a prison, Paul wrote.  The only way out was to fulfill the law and all its requirements perfectly.  Christ came to fulfill the law for us and to free us from its demands.  He paid the price for not keeping the law by becoming a curse for us.[6]  And now we are free.

Paul writes that as long as someone is a minor they may be in line for the inheritance of the father, but they are really no better than a slave until that time.  The young man remains under the guardian and trustee until the time set by the father for the son to be the full inheritor.

That time came for us when God sent his Son, who was born of a woman, born under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons and daughters. If the law was our previous master, now through grace Christ is our new master. 

It is amazing, though, how we so easily slip into the role of slave before God.  Remember Jesus’ parable of the two sons and the father – what we most often call the parable of the Prodigal? The younger son returns home after wild and reckless living and is accepted by his father with grace, love and forgiveness.  He didn’t do anything to earn or deserve it.  The father just treats him that way because this is his son and he loves him.

The older son – the one who stayed home, was responsible and obeyed, went to church – can’t believe it.  And he says to the father in anger, “You listen to me!  All these years I have been working like a slave for you.”[7]

If we are trying to work for our Father’s love and acceptance, we put ourselves in the position of a slave in relation to God.  But we aren’t slaves.  We are children.

When Jesus was baptized the Father confirmed “This is my Son whom I love.”  Jesus was the Son of God. We are sons and daughters by adoption, and the Father sees us the same way. Let’s learn to enjoy being a son or daughter.

Our status as a child of God is not something to be earned. Now we are not under any rules.  Grace sets us free from rules and regulations.  We are free to do what we want. Some might hear that and think, “Wow, isn’t that great.  I can just please myself in every and anyway.”

Being out from underneath the rules actually takes greater responsibility.  Children need more rules because they don’t have the maturity to know many things and can’t do them on their own. A bedtime is set because children will stay up all night and it won’t be pretty for them or the parents, will it?  So we have rules.

But when we grow up we are no longer bound by rules.  In the life of faith we might call this the responsibility of grace.  Yes, we are free to do whatever we want.  But grace can be honored or abused.  Our position as sons and daughters can be honored or abused.

Grace takes being spiritually grown-up enough to live maturely before God.    One of the early church fathers said, “Love God, and do anything you want.”    If we truly love God, what are we going to do?

And all of this is grace.  And grace is always God’s work and God’s gift to us. What does it say? “But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption as children.”[8]

God is the one who sent. God is the one who came. God is the one who went to the cross. God is the one who came out of the tomb. And he makes us his children.

Did you hear the word “receive”?  We receive adoption as his children. It’s a gift.  It’s grace.

As another apostle, John, writes in one of his letters: “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!  And that is what we are!”[9] That’s what you are.  That’s what I am.

So live in that great love and live with confidence and security as children of the living God.

[1] Philip Graham Ryken, Galatians, p. 148

[2] 3:3

[3] 3:12-14

[4] See William Barclay, Galatians , p.32; Ryken, 148-49

[5] This idea comes from Henri Nouwen.

[6] Gal. 3:13

[7] Luke 15:29

[8] 4:5

[9] 1 John 3:1