Ephesians 1:5
This passage, here at the beginning of Ephesians, is one of the longest, hardest, most challenging pieces in the whole New Testament. I’m no Greek scholar, but Greek Scholars say that these 14 verses are basically one long, run on sentence that is a real bear to translate and break down into bite sized, digestible parts. In the English, they’ve broken it into 14 verses. In Greek, it doesn’t break down this way.
Basically, it’s a hymn. A piece of worship music that was sung in worship. It wasn’t intended to be a scholarly piece of theological argument, but a piece of poetry that praised God and celebrated Jesus Christ and lifted up some of the basic things that Christians could celebrate. You don’t really preach about poetry. You don’t really break down and pull out great theological arguments out of a hymn. Basically you sing it and listen to it and let the words and the music touch your heart and take you close to God.
Now, don’t worry. I’m not going to set this ancient hymn to music and try to sing it to you this morning. I’m not that talented…or that crazy. But I do want to focus in on just one idea that is lifted up in verse five of this hymn. Listen to verse 5: “He destined us for adoption as his children.”
“He destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of his will…”
Did you hear that? Basically, this says that you and I have been adopted by God.
That is a powerful, powerful statement. Adopted by God… Adopted by the Creator of the world.
I want to spend a few minutes this morning thinking together about adoption. Thinking about what it means to be adopted by God.
Now some of you have more experience with adoption than I have. Some of you have been adopted. Some of you are adoptive parents. So you know first hand the meaning and power of adoption. What I say here will not be new to you. In fact you may find it very basic. But bear with me, and think about how your own adoption experiences might help you understand this powerful idea of being adopted by God.
First of all, to be adopted is to be chosen. Pure and simple, one who has been adopted has been chosen, embraced, accepted, welcomed, and loved by the parents who do the adopting.
Adoption, when you get right down to it is grace. Pure and true grace.
Jim and Janet Medlen live near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and they are the parents of five children. They are a white couple. Jim is a blue collar worker. Janet stays at home as a mom. They started their family when they adopted an adolescent learning-disabled boy. His name was Bobby Joe and he’s about 25 years old now. He was probably 11 or 12 when they adopted him and welcomed him into their family. A few years later, Eric came along. He was 12 and a Native American. In order to adopt him, they needed to involve not only the courts, but also had to have the approval of a Native American tribal council. But they really wanted Eric to have a home with them. So they went through the complicated dual processes in order to bring him into their family.
A few years later, they adopted their third boy…their second one named Eric. He’s now 16. And then a few years later, another boy came along…Douglas…they call him DJ. He’s also 16. He says, “It was my last chance. I’d been in all kinds of group homes.”
I look at the Medlens and I see grace. They chose to welcome each of those teenagers into their family. They chose to give them love and a home. Four boys, touched by the grace of two grace-filled parents.
But the story doesn’t end there. A couple of years back, Darnell, a 14 year old, and Antonio an 11 year old, two African American brothers, entered into the foster care system. Over five years, they moved from placement to placement. None of them worked. Finally, a social worker called the Medlens. Could they take these two boys on an emergency basis. That emergency foster placement lasted two years. They fell in love with the boys…and then made it official by adopting them and making them part of the family.
Grace…
The Medlens didn’t make the boys earn a place at their table. They simply welcomed them and loved them and made them family.
That’s the same kind of thing God does. He embraces diverse people…like you and me. People who have done nothing to deserve or earn his love…and God adopts us as his children.
That adopting grace is what we celebrate when we baptize a child here in our church. An infant baptism shows it especially well…a baby who’s done nothing at all to earn a place in God’s family is sprinkled with the waters that say, “You are chosen by God. You belong to God’s family. You’ve been adopted.”
That wonderful little song we sing when we baptize a baby sums it up: “Daniel, Daniel, God claims you. God helps you, protects you, and loves you, too. We this day do all agree, a child of God you’ll always be. Daniel, Daniel, God claims you. God helps you, protects you, and loves you, too.”
Another hymn goes like this: “Wonder of wonders, here revealed, God’s covenant with us is sealed, and long before we know or pray, God’s love enfolds us everyday. Here in this sacrament we see, God’s grace unbound, for all, for me! May we respond with joyful praise in loving service all our days.”
You’ve been adopted by God. Claimed. Welcomed. Embraced. It is purely and simply an act of grace.
So first of all, adoption by God means being chosen by God.
The second thing I want us to think about are some of the benefits of that adoption. The benefits of being chosen and welcomed into a family.
The young couple went to Bolivia to enter into mission work among the Quecha Indians. The father was a Bolivian citizen, the mother an American. They went to Bolivia along with their infant daughter.
Immediately upon arriving, they began to cultivate relationships with the Quecha people. One man they met was a native Quecha who pastored a little Quecha church. He had a big family and his wife was ready to deliver yet another child.
The delivery wasn’t easy. In fact…it was tragic. While the child lived, the mother was overwhelmed by the complications of childbirth and she died. The basic medical care available to the Quecha Indians wasn’t enough to save her.
The young missionary mother was still nursing her own infant and she offered to nurse and care for the newborn Quecha baby as well. She took him and nursed him as her own, side by side with her own child. After a time, the baby’s father came by and confessed that there was no way he could ever take care of the baby. He already had several children. He was stressed out, burdened, and overwhelmed. The missionary mother could just keep the baby she had been nursing. And with that he gave up his child…and the little missionary family unexpectedly and suddenly grew to include two babies.
It was about fifteen years ago when my sister Beth went to live among the Quecha people in Bolivia. Her son…my nephew…David…that’s what they ended up naming him…is now a big, strong, healthy teenager. We see him every couple of years when they visit in the States and we marvel at the young man he has become.
When I think about David…and what he received when he came to live with Beth, a number of things come to mind. At the most basic level, he received nourishment and care. He received medical attention and nutrition. The basics that would let him start off his life as a healthy baby.
More than that, David received a family. He received a name. (I don’t know if he had a name yet when they took him in.) He received a name and some roots. He was given hope and a future and a family.
Adoption conveys all of those things. The one who is adopted receives a new status. No longer an orphan. No longer one who is unwanted. No longer one who is uncared for. The one who is adopted is given a gift of new life.
The same thing happens when we’ve been adopted by God. We receive a name…”child of God.” We receive nourishment…spiritual nourishment that revives our souls. We receive a family…not just a biological family…but a whole extended family of brothers and sisters and fathers and mothers and grandparents in the faith…and this family will always be there for us to share with us and laugh with us when we are celebrating…and cry with us and walk with us when the days are dark. It’s a family that will encourage us in faith and surround us with grace and teach us the ways of life as a disciple of Christ.
Adoption by God means that God has chosen us and extended his grace to us. It also means that we will be blessed and embraced in ways we never dreamed of before.
Finally, third, …adoption brings with it some responsibilities as well. It is all well and good to celebrate God’s grace and to give thanks for the blessings that come with adoption. But the fact of the matter is, once you’ve been adopted, you take on some new ways of living.
In short, you have to follow the rules of the new household, the new family where you have come to live.
Remember Antonio and Darnell Medlen, the boys I told you about earlier. They had spent five years without any structure in their lives. Five years bouncing from foster home to foster home. Five years in which there were no consistent rules or authority figures or responsibilities in their lives.
I’m sure that changed when they came to be with the Medlens. The Medlens had house rules, curfews, expectations for how the boys would treat each other, chores they were expected to do, and certain behaviors they expected the boys to give up.
Being adopted isn’t just about receiving the gift and then just having a good old time living however you please. Being adopted means living under the rules and expectations of the new family.
When you and I are adopted…when we are baptized into God’s family…we begin a lifelong journey of learning to live in that family. It might mean giving up some habits. It might mean taking on some new ones. It always means engaging in some kind of ministry. For you see, by virtue of our baptism, you and I are called to be ministers...men and women who share the grace of Christ and make that grace more abundant in the world around us.
Probably the best adoption story of all is God’s adoption of Israel as his chosen people. He took a tribe of folks who were insignificant nobodies and made them his own. But God didn’t do it just for their own good. God chose Israel not just for a special blessing but for a special responsibility. Israel would be God’s way of reaching out to the world. Israel would be God’s light to all of the other nations. Israel would ultimately be God’s means of reaching the world through Jesus Christ. They were chosen and adopted…and given a special role to do God’s work.
The writer of Ephesians says, “He destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of his will.”
…Destined for adoption…
It’s just a little phrase tucked away in an ancient hymn. But the message is powerful:
You and I are adopted, chosen by God….it’s an act of pure grace.
Adoption brings with it life and a name and new status and blessings we never dreamed of.
As those who’ve been adopted, you and I have a responsibility to be God’s children of grace in ministry to the world in which we live.
Thanks be to God. Amen.