18 Jul The Grace of God (Part 12): Adopting Grace
The next time you see a child that has been adopted into a family and loved, remember that every Christian is like that. God is a Father, the Church is a family, and each Christian has been, in a very real spiritual sense, adopted by the Father into the family.
Adopting grace results in God becoming our spiritual Father and including us as members of His family, the church.
Ephesians 1:4–6 says, “In love, he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.”
Adopting grace completely transforms our motive for holy living. With God as our loving and perfect Father and the church as our helpful brothers and sisters, we seek to live good lives and do good works because that is what our family does; we don’t do them in order to be part of the family. This means that rather than adopting grace serving as a license for sin, it makes us part of a people who are so loved and served by their Father that the last thing they would want to do is bring disrepute to His name or harm to their loving family. After all, we have such a great Father who has loved us so well that we want to be with Him and be like Him by the grace of the Holy Spirit.
What do you think about when you consider that God is a Father who has adopted you along with your brothers and sisters in Christ?
