This morning I want to answer one question. It is both a very simple and a very important question. What is a Christian?
You may answer that a Christian is somebody who prays. Or who reads their Bible. Or who goes to church. Or who loves their neighbour. But good as they are to do, doing those things does not make a person a Christian.
You may answer that a Christian is somebody who believes in God. Or that a Christian is a disciple of Jesus. Those are indeed things which a Christian does, but I want to suggest that first and foremost those are not the things which makes somebody a Christian.
You may say that a Christian is somebody whose sins have been forgiven, somebody who has been born again, somebody who has eternal life. Those blessings are entirely and gloriously true. But still I want to suggest that there is something even more important about being a Christian. Something even more wonderful, which we read about here in Galatians 3:26.
Gal 3 26 So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith
WE ARE ALL CHILDREN OF GOD
Being Christians is all about being God’s beloved children. Paul repeats the idea a few verses later in chapter 4.
Gal 4 4 But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship.
A Christian is somebody who has received adoption to sonship. God has adopted us as his children. That is a term referring to the legal standing of a child in Roman culture. Adoption to sonship. J.B.Phillips translates this as we have become, by adoption, true sons of God. The Message says we are fully adopted as God’s own children. We each have the full rights of a child of God. This is so important that Paul repeats it again in verse 7.
7 So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child;
Just take a moment to let that sink in. A Christian is a person who enjoys the immense privilege of a personal relationship with the Creator and Sustainer of the universe. If you are a Christian, you are a child of God and God is your heavenly Father. You are God’s beloved child.
So we pray. But we don’t pray because that makes us a Christian. We pray because we are God’s children and communication is at the heart of every relationship. We read our Bibles, but not because that makes us a Christian. We read our Bibles because are God’s children we want to learn more about our heavenly Father and our Saviour Jesus Christ and we want to hear Him speak to us. Coming to church does not make us anybody a Christian, but because we are God’s children we are delighted to gather together to meet with Him and worship Him. Loving our neighbour does not make anybody a Christian. But because we are God’s children we want to show the same love to everybody else as God has demonstrated to us in Jesus Christ. Sometimes we all struggle with prayer, or Bible study, or coming to church or loving our neighbours. If you ever find these things difficult, remember why you are doing them. Because you are a child of God.
Our sins have been forgiven. We have received the amazing free gift of eternal life. But these blessings are not ends in themselves. Forgiveness and eternal life are just the steps on the way to God adopting us as his children.
Gal 3 26 So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith,
Yes, faith is important. A Christian is indeed somebody who believes in God and who is a disciple of Jesus. But all of that is just our response to the love which God has poured out on us in making us his children. Our faith is just the way that we receive and experience that incredible privilege of being God’s child.
1 John 3:1 See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!
J.B.Phillips: “See what incredible love God has for us!” Great. Incredible. Amazing. Fantastic. Wonderful love of God extravagantly poured out on us! The riches of God’s grace, the unsearchable riches of Christ – LAVISHED upon US! God loves us so much that he calls us his children. That is why we put our trust in God and live as followers of Jesus.
But how do we know we are really Christians? How can we be certain that we are God’s children. I’m going to stay in Galatians chapter 4 for Paul’s answer to that.
Gal 4 6 Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, ‘Abba, Father.’
We know we are God’s children because we have received the Holy Spirit. God the Holy Spirit has given us new birth and eternal life. The Holy Spirit lives inside us. And the Holy Spirit enables us to cry out to God, “Abba, Father”.
J.B. Phillips It is because you really are his sons that God has sent the Spirit of his Son into your hearts to cry “Father, dear Father”.
Message . You can tell for sure that you are now fully adopted as his own children because God sent the Spirit of his Son into our lives crying out, “Papa! Father!” Doesn’t that privilege of intimate conversation with God make it plain that you are not a slave, but a child?
Last week in Galatians 3 Chris pointed us to the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit in the lives of God’s children.
Gal 3:5So again I ask, does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you by the works of the law, or by your believing what you heard?
The apostle Paul clearly expected the Galatian Christians to know in their experience that they had received the Holy Spirit, and indeed also that the Holy Spirit would be at work among them in signs and wonders. We know that we are God’s children because we know we have received God’s Holy Spirit. Romans chapter 8 says the same, and more.
Rom 8 14 For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. 15 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’ 16 The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.
The Holy Spirit leads God’s children. It is the role of the Holy Spirit is to bring about our adoption to sonship. It is the Holy Spirit who enables us to recognize God as Abba Father. And we have the inner witness of the Holy Spirit that we are indeed God’s children.
Good News Bible: “God’s Spirit joins himself to our spirits to declare that we are God’s children.”
J.B. Phillips “The Spirit himself endorses our inward conviction that we really are the children of God.”
So that is what a Christian really is. A child of God. Again just take a moment to reflect on that glorious truth. Repeat it for yourself. “I am a child of God. I am a child of God!” “We are children of God.”
I am supposed to be getting to the end of Galatians 4 this week. But there is no way I can do that because there are two more very important things we need to bring out of the short passage we already read. And the first comes just at the end of chapter 3.
Gal 3 28 There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
Because Christians are all equally God’s children, we are all one in Christ. We are all equal with each other.
WE ARE ALL UNITED IN CHRIST
We are all united in God’s Family . There was a daily Jewish prayer which Paul as a good Pharisee would have prayed every day. “God, I thank you that I was not born a Gentile, but a Jew: not a slave, but a free man: not a woman, but a man.”
Here in Galatians 3:28 Paul was deliberately contradicting each phrase of that prayer which he had been taught to pray in his childhood.
28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
Paul was totally opposed to divisions within any church or congregation:-
There must be NO RACIAL divisions – 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek,
Even more than ever, as Britain and even Colchester becomes more multicultural, Christians must make sure there is no racial prejudice in our lives and our churches. Mahatma Ghandi wrote in his autobiography that during his student days he was interested in the Bible. Ghandi was deeply touched by reading the gospels, he seriously considered becoming a convert. Christianity seemed to offer the real solution to the caste system that was dividing the people of India. One Sunday he went to a church to see the minister and ask for instruction on the way of salvation and other Christian doctrines. But when he entered the sanctuary, the ushers refused him a seat and suggested that he go and worship with his own people. He left and never went back. “If Christians have caste differences also,” he said to himself, “I might as well remain a Hindu.”
Here at Orchard Baptist Church we must make sure that we welcome all people equally, no matter what race or nation they come from. No racial divisions.
There must be NO CLASS divisions – There is neither … slave nor free,
We don’t have slaves in England any more – but some senses of class identity and class divisions remain. There are wealthy people and poor people, professional people and business people and tradespeople and unemployed people. There are people with visible and invisible disabilities. There are traditional nuclear families and extended families and broken families. At Orchard Baptist Church we must make sure that EVERYBODY is made to feel equally welcome. No social divisions!
And then there must be NO GENDER divisions – There is neither … male nor female,
Paul wrote in a male dominated society. In many places women, like slaves, were treated simply as property. We must make sure that we welcome and respect women equally with men in every way. No gender divisions.
All one in Christ Jesus. No divisions on the grounds of race or class or gender. If Paul were writing to churches today I believe he would also say
“There are neither old people nor young people – for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”
We must be sure to welcome and affirm our young people as much as we welcome and affirm adults in the life of the church. Children and young people are not tomorrow’s church. They are a valued part of today’s church and we must never forget that. We must always be vigilant in that area. No ageism. I think Paul would also say,
“There are neither long-standing Christians nor brand new Christians – for all are one in Christ Jesus.”
Many of us in the church have been Christians for decades or more. Indeed many were brought up in Christian homes immersed in church life from childhood. But when God brings in new Christians – new believers, these will probably be folk who have never gone to church before, never believed before! They won’t have the background in Bible knowledge and church customs we all have. And yet they will be just as much a part of God’s forever family, just as much a part of the body of Christ as any of us who have been saved for years and years. If there is a real risk of division in churches it will be between established Christians who are familiar with everything that goes on and new Christians who are completely lost, learning things and facing situations for the first time. We must bend over backwards to welcome new Christians into the church, to take care of them and support them in their new faith – because we are ALL ONE in Christ Jesus!
One more thing. There should be no Baptists or Anglicans or Roman Catholics or free church people or evangelicals or charismatics
28b for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
This is the slogan of the KESWICK convention which celebrated its 150th anniversary last year. There is no place for divisions between denominations. Our allegiance should not be to a particular denomination, or churchmanship, or even a specific theology. We are all equally children of God.
God’s purpose is that the church should be His visual aid to the world of the difference that His love and forgiveness makes. But we give a very poor example of reconciliation if the world sees the church divided and arguing. God commands us to show His kind of sacrificial love to this sin-spoilt world, but He gives us other Christians to practise on. If we can’t even love each other, how can we begin to seek and save the lost? Christians and churches all need to demonstrate that we are all one in Christ Jesus.
Christians are children of God. We are all one in Christ Jesus. And one final thought to take away and rejoice in this week.
Gal 4 7 So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir.
Good News And since you are his child, God will give you all that he has for his children.
Message And if you are a child, you’re also an heir, with complete access to the inheritance.
WE ARE ALL HEIRS OF GOD
In Romans 8:17, Paul writes: “Now if we are [God’s] children, then we are heirs–heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ…” (NIV)
By our faith in Christ we become his adopted brothers and sisters–adopted sons and daughters of God. As fully adopted and accepted children, we share the same inheritance as God’s Son, Jesus.
J.B. Phillips Think what that means. If we are his children we share his treasures, and all that Christ claims as his will belong to all of us as well!
We begin to experience this glorious inheritance in this life, and then we will enjoy it to the full in the next. Most people inherit things when somebody else dies – only a Christian inherits when he or she dies!
What is it that keeps Christians going when the battle against sin and the world and the flesh and the devil seems too hard? When this life seems so full of pain and suffering and discouragement. When it seems as if everybody is against us in the world around and sometimes even in church – and it seems as though nobody is on our side? What keeps us going? It is the happy certainty of heaven. The best is yet to come. We have the trustworthy promises of God that however grim this world may get, the next world will be literally “out of this world!” We are heirs of God.
“I wonder many times how a child of God could have a sad heart, considering what the Lord is preparing for him.” Samuel Rutherford (1600–1661)
The sufferings of this life are not worth comparing with the glory which is to be revealed in us! As Thomas Moore said, “Earth has no sorrow which heaven cannot heal.” We are heirs of God.
When he was preparing his son to become the Monarch, King George V would often remind Prince Edward VII, “My Dear Child, always remember who you are.” This is what God is saying to every Christian. “Remember who you are!”
We are all Children of God. We are United in God’s Family, all one in Christ Jesus. We are heirs of God, sharing a wonderful inheritance which begins now and will continue throughout eternity. If you are a Christian, if you’ve put your trust in Christ this is YOU. You are a child of God! Remember who you are!
This sermon is posted on this page because I am in the process of rewriting my main site. All my previous sermons are still available to read on http://pbthomas.com/blog
