I love to read and study God's word. However, there are many concepts in the Bible that I probably do not fully yet understand, let alone know how to apply. Because of this I believe that God has allowed me to live out a few concepts he desperately wants me to grasp. One of those concepts is adoption.
Growing up in the church, I cannot count how many times I read the great verses in the bible about adoption. To be quite honest with you, I read them or heard them and often was unmoved by their importance, "understanding" them but not really understanding how much they applied to me. Not just me, but every child of God. Not just every child of God, but every human being ever created.
Adoption is God's idea. Adoption is what God does. It is his design.
It wasn't until we walked through the steps of our adoption that I finally "got it".
Ephesians 1:3-6
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, 4 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love 5 he predestined us[b] for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, 6 to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.
This is going to be lengthy...just warning you, but stick with me!
When we went through the adoption process the first time, they have you fill out a "domestic service plan." This plan is where you "pick" your child. Even writing this makes me cringe. You can specify everything about the child that you are willing and open to adopting. Everything from race, gender, age, medical background, birth parents background, everything. When we filled this service plan out we said, any child. Any child God has for us to adopt, we will adopt. We choose in our hearts that no matter what child God brought into our home we would love and parent. Any child.
This is exactly what God has done for us! All of us! He looks at us as says, "any of those who will come!" Any Child! This is huge! We are all chosen by him!
We choose any child, but really our choice didn't make a difference until that child (or his birth mom) choose us. She had to make that choice in her heart before he actually became ours. She made a huge sacrifice to allow this adoption to happen. This sacrifice caused and may very well still cause her tremendous pain. She did it though, because she loved our son, her son.
This is like Christ going on our behalf to his father saying, "I want to sacrifice myself for them." HE did this for US!
Our son also needed to accept the gift of adoption. He acknowledged us as his parents. This is what you must do to become a child of God! You must accept the gift and privilege of adoption. Then you take your place as a child of the King! In the forever family of God.
Once our son became ours, he got a new name. He took on our last name. He became ours.
We are called blessed by God. We are called children of the KING!
Now, we didn't wait for our son to start "acting like us" He didn't have to prove himself to us. He immediately, from day one, received the benefits of being our child.
Just like us. When we choose to take our place as God's child, we don't have to "clean ourselves up." We don't have to sound like a child of God. We immediately get the benefits of being His child. Now, eventually those things will happen the more time we spend with Him. But we don't have to wait to eat at the Kings table until we "fix" ourselves. He says, "come sit, rest, commune with me, I will do the work!"
At our finalization hearing we received a seal from our state and we had to take an oath stating that he is just as much "our child" as any biologic child we have or will ever have. We also had to sign an oath stating that he is an heir to our inheritance, just as much as any biologic child. That we were forever his parents. WOW!
We are given a seal as children of God. We are given the Holy Spirit. This will never ever be taken from us. God is forever our parent. Our perfect parent. There is nothing we can ever do to change that. Nothing- that means NOTHING, can pluck us from his hand, not even ourselves.
Now some day, our son could decide that he doesn't really like us as parents. He could try to "remove" himself from our family. This will never change our position as parents though! This is sealed for forever!
How awesome is this security that we have in God's family!
I can say, I never truly "got" how important our adoption into God's family is until he showed me by allowing us to live it out.
Multiple times every day, I look at our son adoringly. I cannot believe he is mine. I am crazy about him. God looks at me the same way. He looks at each of us this way. He is crazy about us.
For this reason and so much more, I love adoption.
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