Understanding Our Adoption
I wasn’t born into my forever family. I was born into a precarious situation, a deadly circumstance. My biological parents are great. They love me and did everything they could to help me escape my predicament. But for all their efforts, they couldn’t rescue me.
You see, I was born into sin. I was born an enemy of God. And not just born in the wrong camp. As I grew, I chose to act against God. I wanted to be God. I wanted to judge for myself what was right and what was wrong. You understand my trouble now. I was dead in my trespasses and sin and deserving of God’s righteous wrath. I needed to be saved, even if I didn’t know it.
God did just that. God the Father sent his Son, Jesus, to die in my place. And He raised him by his Spirit that I would be saved by the righteous life and sacrificial death of Jesus. But God didn’t just save me, he adopted me. The almighty, infinite, holy God adopted me — weak, finite, and sinful. What does that even mean? How do we begin to understand what it means when the Bible says that we have received the Spirit of adoption as sons and daughters, by whom we cry out to God, “Abba! Father!”?
God is so gracious to us to give us earthly realities that help us wrap our minds around spiritual realities. So it is with adoption. Earthly adoption, at its best, helps all Christians grow in living out our reality as adopted daughters and sons of God.
When we see the bond of sisters in an adoptive family, we know that there are ties in Christ stronger than the phenotypic tribalism of the world.
When a foster mom stays all day and night in the NICU with a baby, even though the nurses have told her that she doesn’t have to and that usually foster parents don’t stay, we have a deeper understanding of how God’s Spirit never leaves us and always stands guard over our hearts.
When an adopted teen processes the complexities of embracing both birth and adoptive parents and navigating the truth of God’s sovereignty in her story, we are all pressed to meditate on what it means when we read that he knit us together in our mothers’ wombs and that he determined the times set for us and the exact places where we should live.
When an adoptive brother, who only ever wants to wear athletic shorts and soccer jerseys, asks to wear a sport coat for his little sister’s adoption hearing, we catch a glimpse of Jesus as our brother, beaming.
“For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source. That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers or sisters” (Heb. 2:11).
And when an adoptive father tells his daughters, “You make your daddy’s heart very happy,” we can feel, in the deepest parts of our souls, that God delights in us.
There are seemingly countless pathways to adoption in this world and all of them expose a brokenness brought by sin. But in adoption, we are reminded that there is not a brokenness for which God does not have a mercy. Every Christian’s story is the story of Jesus turning brokenness into beauty, to the praise of his name. This reminds us of our need to confess our sins.
Oh, Father, how we dishonor you and bring sorrow upon ourselves because we refuse to believe what you have said about our adoption through Jesus. We do not live as though we are eternally secure within your house as your children. We lash out at our siblings in Christ according to the world’s narratives instead of loving one another according to your word. We convince ourselves that we must earn the position you have freely given us. We try to squander our inheritance from you. We remain miserable because we do not accept that you love us and delight in your children as you delight in Jesus. Forgive us these sins, God, and the sins that we confess to you now in this moment of silence…
…Father, in love, you predestined us for adoption to yourself as sons and daughters through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of your will, to the praise of your glorious grace. In Jesus we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of your grace which you lavished upon us. You have sealed us with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of your glory. Thank you, God. Thank you for saving us and thank you for adopting us. Grant us to live out that truth, for your glory and our great joy! In Jesus name, amen.
