The Father & Child Relationship

Examples, Illustrations, and Metaphors

Of the Church of the New Testament

The Father And Child Relationship

"For ye are all children of God by faith in Christ Jesus" (Gal. 3:26)

The "Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man" is a phrase that through the years has gained great popularity in the religious world. It is widely used, especially by those called "universalists." These believe and teach that somehow God will save all mankind, and none can be lost. In one of my studies with a prominent community leader in Louisiana he so stated, giving as his reason his belief that God will look at only the good of each person and not at any of the bad.

The phrase "fatherhood of God and brotherhood of man" is also employed by many writers and speakers who seem to take it for granted that it is true, because they believe it is a Bible term, that God is indeed the universal Father, and all men, because of this common fatherhood, are brothers.

No good man anywhere would wish for anything other than this: God is the God of all men, and all men are brothers. But, can this statement be justified? Is it a Bible expression?

Let's examine what the Bible has to say about it.

The Basic Text Used To Prove The Contention

1TI 4:10 For therefore we both labour and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God, who is the Saviour of all men, specially of those that believe.

This statement by Paul is used nearly always to prove the doctrine of universal fatherhood. But surely Paul meant that Christ is the potential Savior of all men, and that He becomes the actual Saviour when one believes on Him and obeys the Gospel. These that teach otherwise seem to put all emphasis upon the general truth that says that God must save if man is to be saved, and little or none upon the latter part that says that He is the specific Saviour of only those that believe and obey.

Is The Doctrine Of Universal Fatherhood True?

But, is the phrase "The Fatherhood of God," and the implied "brotherhood of man" a Bible a Bible doctrine? Is God indeed the universal Father of all men? What does the Bible say about it.

It is necessary that one study the teachings of the Bible as a whole in order to build a confident foundation for any doctrine. This we will strive to do to determine the true teachings concerning God's Fatherhood. Single passages, twisted from their context, and considered without regard to general and basic truths of the Scriptures, can so easily be made to teach strange doctrine.

OLD DOCTRINE(S) TEACHINGS

I. The Patriarchal Period

Starting where we first find man we learn that he was created "in the image" and "after the likeness" of God. (Gen. 1:26.) In listing the ancestors of Jesus, Luke concludes with, "Adam, which was the son of God" (Luk 3:38). Our question is, “Of what did this image and likeness consist?”

It is said of Adam, “This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him; . . . And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, and after his image; and called his name Seth:” (Gen 51,3).

The word that gives us "likeness" also gives us "similitude, fashion, and manner.” In Philippians 2:6 we have Jesus in the "form" of God. Form is from morphe, meaning nature, essence.

It is said in Genesis 2:7 that "the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." The word that gives us "soul" also gives us: life, person or persons, heart, mind, creature, body, man, will, desire, lust, spirit, appetite, hearts, breath, etc.

It is reasonable that our word personality is accurate to describe this imaging, and being in the likeness of God. Man's personality was like God's personality.

A. This "personality," which obviously had the potential of both divine nature and the carnal nature, good as well as evil. Even though Adam and Eve were actually with God, the potential to do wrong was present, and they exercised it. They were not strong enough on this occasion to resist the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, they chose to do wrong, and fell away. It is inescapable, from the Bible account, although created in God's image, the first couple still had the capacity to do wrong, as well as right.

B. Soon divided into two classes:

As a result of this sin against the commandment of God, we find a change has taken place in man's relationship to God. Mankind is now apparently divided into two classes. The record tells us:

"And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose. . . . There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown" (Gen 6:1,2,4).

That this was displeasing to God is obvious, for the Scriptures record:

"And the Lord said, My Spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be a hundred and twenty years. . . . And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart. And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them. But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord" (vs. 3,5-8).

Who were these "sons of God" and these "daughters of men?" What characterized their distinctiveness? Surely the sons of God were those, who by their free choice of God as their Father, had had restored to them to some degree the relationship that had been interrupted by Adam's sin. Surely the daughters (as well as sons) of men were those who had followed the ways of their flesh, had chosen Satan as their father, and had partaken of his evil nature and lacked the qualities of Godliness. God's anger was provoked because of the promiscuous intermarriage, without regard to spiritual character.

This is about all that is said about Divine Fatherhood in this earliest period of mankind.

II. The Hebrew Period

A. A Special Relationship:

Upon the organization of the Hebrew nation a special relationship existed between God and Israel as a people. Jehovah says unto Pharaoh: "Israel is my son, my firstborn. Let my son go, that he may serve me; and thou hast refused to let him go; behold, I will slay thy son, thy firstborn" (Ex. 4:22,23).

Many passages from Deuteronomy, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Malachi refer to the fatherly relationship of God to Israel as a nation, but not to individual Israelites, to say nothing of all the rest of mankind. Moses and the other writers speak only of and to Israel, and what Moses says of God as a Father having brought them out of bondage, made and established them as a nation, refers, not to any natural relationship growing out of creation, but only to the fact that God has delivered them from bondage, and established them as a privileged nation.

B. This Relationship Threatened:

Deuteronomy provides a positive argument against the idea of "universal Fatherhood," when it suggests -- if not establishes -- that sonship depends upon character. In Chapter 32 Moses is addressing sinful Israel and says:

"Ascribe ye greatness unto our God. He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he. They have corrupted themselves, their spot is not the spot of his children: they are a perverse and crooked generation. Do ye thus requite the Lord, O foolish people and unwise? is not he thy father and hath bought thee? hath he not made thee, and established thee?" (Deut. 32:3-6). The RSV says: "They have dealt corruptly with him, they are no longer his children because of their blemish; they are a perverse and crooked generation" (v.5).

Verses 17-41 even seem to teach clearly that sin may cause them to forfeit their relationship as his children, and that God may adopt other children in their stead:

"They sacrificed unto devils, not to God; to gods whom they knew not, to new gods that came newly up, whom your fathers feared not. Of the Rock that begat thee thou art unmindful, and hast forgotten God that formed thee. And when the Lord saw it, he abhorred them, because of the provoking of his sons, and of his daughters. And he said, I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end shall be: for they are a very forward generation, children in whom is no faith. They have moved me to jealousy with that which is not God; they have provoked me to anger with their vanities; and I will move them to jealousy with those which are not a people."

C. Malachi 2:10

The principal passage in the Old Testament upon which the advocates of the "universal Fatherhood" of God rest their claim is Malachi 2:10,

"Have we not all one Father? hath not one God created us?"

The universalist says: "It shows beyond question that in the mind of this prophet the Fatherhood of God was coextensive with His creatorship." In other words, by the fact that He created man, He became their everlasting Father. But surely the prophet, being a Jew, was aware of the Old Testament teachings of the Fatherhood being of a national rather than an individual relationship, and surely he is speaking only of and to Jews. He makes this relationship of the Jewish nation to God the basis of his rebuke to them for marrying heathen wives: "Judah hath profaned the holiness of Jehovah, . . . and hath married the daughter of a foreign god" (v. 11). The argument of the prophet would be without force or point, if this were not so.

D. Jeremiah 31:9

Jeremiah 31:9 gives the prevailing Old Testament idea of the Fatherhood of God when he quotes God as saying: "I am a Father to Israel." But, he points to a coming day - in the future - when this relationship will be an individual and personal one rather than to the entire nation. Now this is significantly important.

E. The Scriptures Clearly Teach That A New Age Was Coming:

"In those days they shall say no more, The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the children's teeth are set on edge. But every one shall die for his own iniquity: every man that eateth the sour grape, his teeth shall be set on edge. Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt: . . . But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people . . . for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them" (vs. 29,30-34).

Count the number of times the prophet says "every one, "his own, "all," (down South we say, "each and every,") and "from the least of them unto the greatest of them," etc. Only individuals -- and not groups -- have "inward parts." It has to be individual.

Although it is rather obvious that during the period of the Hebrew nation, most all references refer to God's relationship to the nation of Israel as such, the idea of a personal sonship is foreshadowed in a few passages. In 1 Chronicles 17:13, speaking of Solomon, God says: "I will be his Father, and he shall be my Son." In Psalms 89:26, it is said that David, as a type of the only begotten Son who was to save the world, shall cry, "Thou art my Father, my God." But, such references are very rare, and serve as illustrations of the relationship that is to come in a later day. The word Father was by no means the customary designation of God by the Israelites. Even in the Psalms, which were the most direct expressions of reverence to God taught in the Old Testament, God was not once addressed as "Father" of the people of Israel, or of individual Israelites, but is most often called "King," and his people "servants" of God.

III. The Idea Of A Divine Family Foreshadowed

But while the idea of a personal relationship between God as Father and each follower as child is absent from the Old Testament, the idea of a Divine family is found. In this Divine family:

1. The angels appear as the sons of God.

JOB 38:7 When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?

PSA 89:6 For who in the heaven can be compared unto the LORD? who among the sons of the mighty can be likened unto the LORD?

2. The fatherly nature is indicated in such tender expressions as these:

(1) "A Father of the fatherless . . . is God" (Psalms 68:5), and,

(2) "Like as a father pitieth his children, so Jehovah pitieth them that fear him" (Psalms 103:13).

But while these passages beautifully express the thought that God possesses a loving attitude toward the needy, as we would expect of a true father, they are far from making clear that God is claiming to be the heavenly Father of all men and all men are his children.

It does seem that some of the prophets did indeed catch a glimpse of the day when the Divine Fatherhood would no longer be considered as being based on a peculiar relationship to any nation as such, but on spiritual and moral conditions. This would mean that many who had been considered sons because of their nationality, would lose their sonship by wickedness.

ISA 49:20 The children which thou shalt have, after thou hast lost the other, shall say again in thine ears, The place is too strait for me: give place to me that I may dwell. 21 Then shalt thou say in thine heart, Who hath begotten me these, seeing I have lost my children, and am desolate, a captive, and removing to and fro? and who hath brought up these? Behold, I was left alone; these, where had they been? 22 Thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I will lift up mine hand to the Gentiles, and set up my standard to the people: and they shall bring thy sons in their arms, and thy daughters shall be carried upon their shoulders. 23 And kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers: they shall bow down to thee with their face toward the earth, and lick up the dust of thy feet; and thou shalt know that I am the LORD: for they shall not be ashamed that wait for me.

ISA 65:1 I am sought of them that asked not for me; I am found of them that sought me not: I said, Behold me, behold me, unto a nation that was not called by my name.

ISA 66:10 Rejoice ye with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, all ye that love her: rejoice for joy with her, all ye that mourn for her: 11 That ye may suck, and be satisfied with the breasts of her consolations; that ye may milk out, and be delighted with the abundance of her glory. 12 For thus saith the LORD, Behold, I will extend peace to her like a river, and the glory of the Gentiles like a flowing stream: then shall ye suck, ye shall be borne upon her sides, and be dandled upon her knees. 13 As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you; and ye shall be comforted in Jerusalem. 14 And when ye see this, your heart shall rejoice, and your bones shall flourish like an herb: and the hand of the LORD shall be known toward his servants, and his indignation toward his enemies. 15 For, behold, the LORD will come with fire, and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire. 16 For by fire and by his sword will the LORD plead with all flesh: and the slain of the LORD shall be many. 17 They that sanctify themselves, and purify themselves in the gardens behind one tree in the midst, eating swine's flesh, and the abomination, and the mouse, shall be consumed together, saith the LORD. 18 For I know their works and their thoughts: it shall come, that I will gather all nations and tongues; and they shall come, and see my glory. 19 And I will set a sign among them, and I will send those that escape of them unto the nations, to Tarshish, Pul, and Lud, that draw the bow, to Tubal, and Javan, to the isles afar off, that have not heard my fame, neither have seen my glory; and they shall declare my glory among the Gentiles. 20 And they shall bring all your brethren for an offering unto the LORD out of all nations upon horses, and in chariots, and in litters, and upon mules, and upon swift beasts, to my holy mountain Jerusalem, saith the LORD, as the children of Israel bring an offering in a clean vessel into the house of the LORD. 21 And I will also take of them for priests and for Levites, saith the LORD. 22 For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the LORD, so shall your seed and your name remain. 23 And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the LORD. 24 And they shall go forth, and look upon the carcases of the men that have transgressed against me: for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh.

The ideal relationship in the day that would come would be characterized by the people being called "sons of the living God."

Hosea says of God: "Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured nor numbered; and it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there it shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God" (Hos. 1:10).

Jeremiah says the people would call their God, "my Father" - "They shall call me, my father, and shall not turn away from me" (Jer. 3:19).

Isaiah says the relationship would be not on the basis of creation or race, but of redemption: "Thou, Jehovah, art our Father; our Redeemer from everlasting is thy name" (Is. 63:16).

SUMMARY

So we see the idea of selective, and not universal Fatherhood, taught repeatedly from the Old Testament. It can be summarized thusly:

1. Adam was constituted originally a son of God in possession of the "image" and "likeness" of God.

2. As a consequence of his alienation from God because of sin, the relationship of son to Father was lost, and has never been transmitted by natural generation to any of Adam's descendants.

3. The Hebrews as a nation were called the children of Jehovah, in virtue of their being God's peculiar people. (Deu. 14:1,4.) It was a national and not an individual relationship.

4. Still, even though God is not addressed personally as Father, there is a recognition of a Divine family, and a very loving and tender fatherly affection credited to God.

5. But the day is anticipated when sonship and Fatherhood would be dependent upon likeness of moral character between Father and son, when all men individually might become the sons of God, without regard to race or nationality.

6. In that day the relationship would be dependent upon the new birth in Christ.

THE CHRISTIAN AGE

But now let us come to the Christian age - the age in which we live. What do we learn about the "Fatherhood of God."

I. As Taught By Jesus

In the teachings of Jesus we find the concept of Fatherhood mentioned so often it is almost as if a new revelation had been given. The name "Father" becomes in the New Testament what the name Jehovah was in the Old. For Jesus, the seemingly natural name of God was to be "Father." He seemed always to be conscious of his individual and very personal relationship of son to Father. He endeavored to live in such loving familiarity with God as would characterize the ideal relationship. On one occasion He said, "He that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him" (John 8:29). And, since He was the "only begotten Son of God" He was well equipped to show His followers the loving and meaningful relationship of Father and child. He seemed to devote Himself in word and life to teach and demonstrate that all men who would come to Him as Savior, might now call upon God directly and personally as their Father. He begs them to accept this privilege. He seems to make the idea of the Fatherly love of God the very foundation of His teachings about the kingdom. In what we have come to know as "the model prayer," perhaps more often quoted than any other part of Scripture, He takes us to a feeling of intimacy probably never before attained, even in the most beautiful of the Psalms.

But, on the other hand, nothing is more plainly taught by Jesus than that unbelievers in Him are not in any sense children of God. One of the most severe rebukes ever uttered by the Master was spoken against those who claimed that God was their Father. These were undoubtedly boasting of racial rights as God's chosen people. They say to him, "Abraham is our Father." In the thought of the Jew this was a high claim, and one which was deemed all sufficient and indisputable. But Jesus tried to tell them that there was a spiritual relationship with Abraham which was of more importance than the fleshly relationship. So he answered them,

"If ye were Abraham's children, ye would do the works of Abraham. But now ye seek to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth, which I have heard of God: this did not Abraham. Ye do the deeds of your Father" (John 8:39-41).

Then, not grasping his thought, and perhaps being annoyed that their boast was not conceded, they then made the higher claim, and said,

"We be not born of fornication: We have one Father, even God" (v.41).

Jesus most vehemently denied it, and gave an answer which ought to silence forever all claims to being God's children on the grounds of either creation or natural birth.

"If God were your Father, ye would love me. . . . Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father, it is your will to do" (John 8:42,44).

Surely then, any doctrine of the Divine Fatherhood which holds or implies that men are naturally God's children, or children because of creation, or in any way so related to Him as to exclude the necessity of redemption and adoption, to heirs in His family and kingdom, is not of God, and contrary to the plain testimony of the Lord Himself.

On another occasion, when Jesus was told that His mother and brethren desired to speak with Him, "He stretched forth his hand toward his disciples, and said, Behold, my mother and my brethren! For whosoever shall do the will of my Father who is in heaven, he is my brother, and sister, and mother" (Mat. 12:46-50). Is this not a clear and emphatic statement of the fact that relationship in the Divine family is not a matter of blood, of physical origin and creation, but solely a question of moral and spiritual likeness to the Almighty One. As one man has said, "We are no more the children of God because He created us, than a watch is the son of a watchmaker because he made it."

There is not a single passage in all the four Gospels that tends to prove that Jesus ever taught the universal Fatherhood of God. There is, however, in all the passages where He speaks of God as Father of men something either in the situation, or the context, or the language itself, which restricts this relationship to a certain kind and class of men. This class consists of those who are the real disciples of Jesus; those who, like Jesus are in their heart obedient to the will of their Father. As Paul said,

"For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: and if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together" (Rom. 8:14-17).

If we have reached the point where we acknowledge that we need to be a child of God, and we want to be a child of God, what do we do?

II. A Change Of Relationship Necessary - The New Birth

1. First, to become a child of God today a change of relationship is absolutely necessary. This new relationship comes about by means of a new birth. Jesus himself said, "Except a man be born again, he cannot see (enter) the kingdom of God" (John 3:3).

2. Being a spiritual kingdom, it must be a spiritual birth. "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit" (vs. 5,6). Paul tells us that there is a process:

(1) There must be teaching: "If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus: . . .

(2) There must be repentance from past sins: ". . . that ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; . . ."

(3) There must be the new birth: ". . . and be renewed in the spirit of your mind;" . . .

(4) There must be the reformed life: ". . . and that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness" (Eph. 4:22-24).

The sinner is "dead in trespasses and sins" (Eph. 2:1,5; Col. 2:13; etc.), and needs to be "born again," to receive a new life, and become a new creature (2 Cor. 5:17). Such a life involves a new begetting, a new birth, a new creation. Birth means the bringing into being a new life. To be born, is to become somebody's child; to be born of the Spirit is to be born of God: it is to become a child of God; and there is no other way revealed to enter the kingdom of God and be saved to eternal life.

Obviously this new life, and new relationship of son to God, is essentially connected to the person of Jesus. "I am the way, the truth, and the life," he said, and "no man cometh unto the Father but by me" (John 14:6). The Apostle John records, "But as many as received him, to them gave he the right to become children of God, even to them that believe on his name; who were born, not of blood" - that is, they did not become sons of God through or in virtue of their being of the one blood of which God has made all mankind - "nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God" (John 1:12, 13). And again, "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature, old things are passed away, behold, all things are become new" (2 Cor. 5:17).

Announcing this "right" to become the sons of God is the essence of the Great Commission. "Go into all the world and preach the good news," said Jesus; "He that believeth (in me as the Christ) and is immersed (into me) shall be saved" (Mark 16:15,16). Paul records,"For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female; for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise" (Gal. 3:26-29).

III. The Blessings Of Sonship - What Are They?

Sonship is the highest evidence of God's love. But when one chooses this relationship, and as long as he continues to make it his supreme business to be a son of God, then "all" things become his. Jesus himself said to his disciples, "Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you" (Mat. 6:33). What things is Jesus referring to?

Although spoken in the context of physical necessities here, it is no less true in all spiritual things. Paul gives thanks to "God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ . . . having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will . . . in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace" (Eph. 1:3,5,7). To the Galatians Paul says, "Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. Whereof thou art no more a servant, but a son; and if a son, then an heir of God, through Christ" (Gal.4:6,7).

And so, we have been promised all things -- forgiveness of sins, the Holy Spirit, the necessities of life -- all things necessary. All these blessings belong to the redeemed, and they belong to them as sons; "if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ" (Rom. 8:17). As the song says:

My Father is rich in houses and lands, He holdeth the wealth of the world in his hands!

Of rubies and diamonds, of silver and gold, His coffers are full, -- He has riches untold.

My Father's own Son, the Savior of men, Once wandered o'er earth as the poorest of them;

But now he is reigning in glory on high, Preparing a place for the sweet by and by.

A tent or a cottage, why should I care? They're building a palace for me over there!

Tho' here I'm a stranger yet still I may sing: All glory to God, I'm a child of the King!

I'm a child of the King, A child of the King! With Jesus, my Savior, I'm a child of the King.

IV. How Can We Know If We Are Sons?

First, there will always be a common nature between a father and his son. "Like father, like son," is the old, old expression. In the human relationship, this is determined by the begetting and the physical birth. So also the begetting and the spiritual birth determines spiritual and moral likeness between God and His child.

"If ye know that he is righteous, ye know that every one also that doeth righteousness is begotten of him" (1 John 2:29).

"We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not" (1 John 5:18).

"In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother" (3:10).

Furthermore, God promises to be a Father only to those who "come out from among them," and are "separate," and who "touch no unclean thing," and to all these, and these only, He says, "Ye shall be to me sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty" (2 Cor. 6:17,18).

The possession of the Holy Spirit of God is a conclusive factor in our sonship, for, "If any man hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his" (Rom. 8:9), and again, "As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God," and, "The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God" (vs. 14,16).

How can we know that we are children of God? One strong indication that helps assure us of sonship is our willingness to bear correction.

"And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him; for whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye illegitimate, and not sons" (Heb. 12:5-8).

-- HT (borrowed from several sources)

Endnotes: