Ga 4:4-7
28 December 2008
1st Sunday after Christmas / 4th Day of Christmas
“We Have Been Adopted”
This past week we remembered and celebrated God’s entry into the world through the Son, Jesus Christ. Our reading for this, the first Sunday after Christmas, is meant to address the question, “Now what?” Now that the Savior of the world has come, what do we do?
Of course, the question, “Now what?” has another meaning for us today, since this is Westminster’s final worship service.
“When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law” (v. 4). That’s how our text in Galatians begins. One might say that it’s a sentence pregnant with meaning!
It continues in verse 5, “in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children.” This scripture, describing the event of Christmas, points to two aspects of salvation—justification and adoption.
Justification is in one sense a negative work. It involves—in Christ—a redemption, a restoration, an erasing of the mark of sin. Adoption, on the other hand, is more of a positive work. Something new is brought into being. Paul says to the Galatians that the birth of Jesus is the story of a new member in the family. Applied to us, it means that we have been adopted into God’s family.
So there are different images at work. A prisoner who has served a term may be cleared legally, but whether he or she is received back into the family of society is an open question. It’s likely that the stigma of being in prison will continue to be carried. We don’t quite get the sense of warmth from being justified that we do from being adopted.
For me, the imagery of adoption is especially meaningful. Like my sister, I was adopted as an infant. Because I was adopted, while growing up, I never questioned whether or not I was wanted. I knew that I had been chosen, and I knew that my parents had to go through a lot of screening as a result of that choice.
I think I’ve always had, even if unconsciously, some sense of what it means to be chosen by God. I have had the sense of being brought into a family, into a way of life.
God, by adopting us into the family, invites us to realize our full potential. That’s a note of great joy—and great concern. I think there’s no greater challenge than realizing one’s full potential. There are many forces working against that—forces outside us and forces inside us. Among those internal forces is our old buddy, sloth. (I think I’m safe in saying that this will be the last time you hear me mention sloth in a sermon!)
Wendy Wasserstein has spoken on its effect on our potential.[1] “When you achieve true slothdom,” she says, “you have no desire for the world to change. True sloths are not revolutionaries…Sloths are neither angry nor hopeful. They are not even anarchists. Anarchy takes too much work. Sloths are the lazy guardians at the gate of the status quo…
“Whether you’re a traditional sloth or a New Age übersloth, we are all looking at the possibility of real thought [horrors!], and rejecting it. Better to fall into line than to question the [party line].”
There are plenty of ways that we’re lulled into complacency. Owen Edwards, in language reminiscent of science fiction, comments on our “[drifting] toward our digital dream.”[2] The longer we stay plugged in—to TV, computer, cell phone, BlackBerry, iPod, whatever—the less time we have for real world, real time, face-to-face interaction.
Despite all that, verse 6 tells us that because we’ve been adopted, “because [we] are children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, ‘Abba! Father!’” That Spirit recognizes and calls out to the Father. We are energized from within toward our God-given potential. We are not left alone.
We should bear in mind that the Spirit who recognizes the Father isn’t a spirit of private revelation. This Spirit is the one who teaches us that our growth is tied to the rest of the family. Sometimes that means doing stuff we don’t want to. But it also means experiencing life more deeply than we possibly could alone. The spirit of adoption, the Spirit that sounds the cry of “Abba, Father” deep within—this is the Spirit that renews us in the family likeness.
So—what of all this? What does our adoption mean? The passage ends in verse 7 by saying that we have become heirs. No longer slaves, we have become adopted children, and so, heirs to what God has in store. So, we accept the privileges and responsibilities that come with membership in the family. We seek to find our place, our role, in the family. This is what we do, now that the Savior of the world has come.
I hope we will take to heart the warning about being “lazy guardians at the gate of the status quo.” If you’ve learned anything from me (and I think Banu would agree), it’s this: never be satisfied. That is, never stop asking questions, keep stretching yourselves, and as I said on Christmas Eve, be zealous for good deeds.
The Spirit within us—and among us—gives us the help we need, because after all, we have been adopted.