Being Put Up for Adoption

Being Put Up for Adoption

Wednesday, December 17th, 2008

Read Galatians 4:1-7.

Have you ever known a family who has adopted a child?  Or have you known a person who was adopted? The first family that I met with adopted children had 3 kids.  2 of them were adopted and the 3rd was a surprise blessing from God.  

I learned about the older children being adopted when the youngest one mentioned that her special day, Andrea Day, was coming up.  It was April Fool’s Day.  Confused I asked her what she meant.  She said that in her family all the children have a birthday and a day where they celebrate joining the family.  You see for her adopted brother and sister they each had a birthday and a day when they came to the family.   My friend’s parents chose April Fool’s Day to be the official “Andrea Day.”  They thought it was appropriate since they had been convinced that they could not have children of their own.

That family was so close and full of so much love.  I was always really impressed with them.  And had my friend not told me that her brother and her sister were adopted I would have never known. 

That is often the way it is in adopted families.  The adopted children and the natural children cannot be told apart.  The way the parents act toward them is identical.  In families where there are only adopted children, an outsider can seldom guess about the adoption unless the children look strikingly different from the parents.

Paul uses adoption to describe our place in The Family.  God’s son was born under the law in order to redeem those of us who were under the law (everyone) so that we might receive adoption into the family of God. 

An adopted child is not a child by birth right, but by the law.  

Likewise, we are not God’s children by virtue of birth, but by the action of Christ to make us blameless before the law.  As a sign that we have been put into the family through Christ, God has sent his Spirit to us that calls out from our hearts ‘Abba, Father.’

Elswewhere Paul writes that it is only through the Spirit that we can make the proclamation: “Jesus is Lord.”

If we belong to Christ, through faith, we belong to the family of God.  We are entitled to all the benefits of the family.  Though adopted sons and daughters we are treated as though we belong, celebrated as true heirs to the kingdom.  You might even say that Easter is our own special “Andrea Day.”

Thinking about how my friend’s familiy with adopted children and natural children wrapped in love with no distinction between them gives me a glimpse into the depth of love that God has for those of us who are committed to Christ and adopted into the family by faith.

The joy I have seen in adoptive parents must reveal at least in part the great joy of God the Father for each of us. 

Advent is the time when we remember backward and forward to Christ acheiving our adoption and returning to welcome us home.