My understanding of the family of God as little as it it is is nowhere close to the appreciation of the grandeur it deserves. We have been brought into an heavenly family. God is our real spiritual Father. He is as connected as an earthly father in fact more so, because we share one of his sons X chromosomes. I may be poor but I have a brother in heaven who is rich. A brother in heaven where I am going and will one day meet.
Yet, if we look around we shall find we are in an enemies country. There are more spies, double agents, and deceptive forces than we realize. The mere act of looking out a window can cause the green sin of envy and jealous root of bitterness to shoot up within us. Therefore we should expect trouble, in God's regiments we are the mark of all the riflemen of the enemy.We must all be on our guard for the devil has deceived many soldiers of the cross by making them fall into sins that few thought possible at one point in their spiritual walk. We are strangers and sojourners in a land not our own, as Israelites seeking the promised haven, so we as Christians are today. The world is not our friend if it is then we are not God's friend. According to CH Spurgeon: "Be assured that thou shalt find foe-men everywhere. When thou sleepest, think thou art resting on the battlefield; when thou wakest, suspect an ambush in every hedge. As mosquitoes are said to bite strangers more than natives so will the trials of earth be sharpest to you. Lastly look within thee, into thine own heart, if thou hadst no devils to tempt thee, no enemies to fight, and no world to ensnare thee, thou wouldst still find in thyself evil enough to be a sore trouble for thee".
I pray that we will remember that we are eternal beings, future-eternal not past-eternal and we will one day judge angels on thrones, judge angels? The seraphim and cherubum? It is impossible, surely angels are greater in power and might than us poor feeble mortal folk? Yet it says it scripture "we shall judge angels" how marvelous a picture this is. As humans we were all made lower than angels but Jesus through being made"a little lower than the angels" he has brought us up with him, and now through his efficacious blood we will reign with him and have his very righteousness attributed to us. Could these be the fallen angels Paul is referring to? Possible, he does not make this distinction. However, judge we will is all we are sure of in this present estate.
In Ephesians 1:5 “we read that he predestined us to be adopted as his sons (and daughters) through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will.”
According to Charles Spurgeon: "I believe God has made many things that are not his children. He made the angels, who stand in an high and holy position, are they his children? "Unto which of the angels said he at any time, thou art my son?" I do not find, as a rule, that angels are called the children of God; No, beloved, it needs something beyond creation to constitute the relationship, and those who can say, "Our Father which art in heaven," are something more than God's creatures: they have been adopted into his family. He has taken them out of the old black family in which they were born; he has washed them. and cleansed them, and given them a new name and a new spirit, and made them "heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ;" and all this of his own free, sovereign, unmerited, distinguishing grace." John Bunyan, in the first part of his "Pilgrim's Progress," describes Christian as a lonely traveler, pursuing his road to the Celestial City alone; occasionally he is attended by Faithful, or he meets with a Hopeful; but these are casual acquaintances, and are not of his kith or kin: brother or child after the flesh he has none with him." SO as we as Christians make our way through this weary world full of woe, we will find heavenly family members who are our brothers and sisters in the spirit. I must hold that in the moment when Jesus Christ paid my debts, my debts were cancelled—in the hour when He worked out for me a perfect righteousness, it was imputed to me, and therefore I may, as a believer say I was complete in Christ before I was born.I find this amazing truth in the gospel that states: It is in the souls of men that God delights. Angels have not souls as they are heavenly spirits and cannot sing in this same redemption song. But can only be partakers to gawk and wonder at the unfathomable love of their God.
The legalist says "I don't see it. I cannot have it and I won't, if we are both equal in character, it cannot be fair that one should be lost and the other saved" and thus he mocks at free grace. This will always be unpopular and men will hate it. They cannot fathom how it could not be a show of works and instead a show of God's rich and free undeserving grace to us poor sinners. What? Popular to humble a mans pride, to abolish mans standing, and make him cringe before God as a poor sinner? No they grind their teeth at this. WE all fancy ourselves as little Gods, little deities in this vast universe, surely that cannot be the case. it is far too self-abasing No it will never be popular til men are born pure as angels, and all of us love the Lord with an appreciation unmatched, and that will not be seen just yet in this world.
I wanted to close this with another inspiring quote from the prince of preachers: "He who knows himself will never think that he has much to recommend of himself to God. In cases of adoption, there usually is some recommendation. A man, when he adopts a child, sometimes is moved thereto by its extraordinary beauty, or at other times by its intelligent manners, and winning disposition. But, beloved, when God passed by the field in which we were lying, He saw no tears in our eyes till He put them there Himself! He saw no contrition in us until He had given us repentance; there was no beauty in us that could induce Him to adopt us—on the contrary we were everything that was repulsive! And if He had said, when He passed by, “You are cursed, be lost forever,” it would have been nothing but what we might have expected from a God who had been so long provoked and whose majesty had been so terribly insulted! But no, though He found a rebellious child, a filthy, frightful, ugly child, He took it to His bosom and said, “Black though you are, you are beautiful in My eyes through My Son, Jesus. Unworthy though you are, yet I cover you with His robe, and in your Brother’s garments, I accept you. “you are made a prince! You are adopted into the royal family, and you shall one day wear a crown! You are now as much the son of God, as you are the son of your own father.” You can conceive the poor creature fainting with joy at such a thought, that he whose neck was just ready for the halter, should have his head now ready for a crown—that he who expected to be clothed in the felon’s garb and taken away to death, is now to be exalted and clothed in robes of honor! So, Christian, think what you did deserve—robes of shame and infamy—but you are to have those of glory. Are you in God’s family now? Well said the poet— “It does not yet appear, How great we must be made.” We do not know the greatness of adoption yet. Yes, I believe that even in eternity we shall scarcely be able to measure the infinite depth of the love of God in that one blessing of “adoption by Jesus Christ unto Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will.”
Let us think of the many of our brothers and sisters that are in the back streets of the world, that are in the dens and caves of Satan. "Think of the poor brothers and sisters that are intoxicated with the spirit of the evil one; think of him or her, led astray by pride, greed, lust and discontent, and perhaps to murder, pray for them, pray for us all and may God keep us all -- His eternal family, in the sovereign grip of His Almighty Grace"
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