SCRIPTURE: Ephesians 1:3-14
TEXT: 5He destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of his will, 6to the praise of his glorious grace that he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. THEME: INTRODUCTION Tying the Reign of Christ theme from Advent with the Christmas everyday theme, we first looked at getting dressed as a way of putting on the qualities of our relationship with Jesus on every day. Today we take “living Christmas Everyday” in a different direction by living with our identity, as an adopted member of God’s family. SCRIPTURE The Author of the letter, to the church in Ephesus informs our discussion on adoption. Ephesians is a carefully laid out argument for our adoption as God’s children (5). This has been God’s plan from the very beginning (3) of Creation, not our recovery from the inevitable fall in the garden, but about our being loved and adopted as the children of God. God does not hold back anything from us. Abundant grace, abundant love, and amazing world are all part of God’s plan for intimacy. To draw us into a deep relationship with God where we become partners in living. Partners, not perfect. God is perfect but that doesn’t mean that we have to be. That comes as we get to know God, we are influenced by God’s ways and experience God’s love that desires the very best for us. (Notice I didn’t say everything that gives us everything that we want but moves us towards what is best for us). This is transformational and moves us towards a better version of ourselves. We are always journeying towards God, in becoming. Often times when we we read this passage, we overlay a template of salvation that portrays God’s love in debt canceling forgiveness. But once the debt is canceled then what? Our salvation is not the end goal, as it is in so many theologies. It is the entrance way into a compelling life lived in dynamic relationship with God. (5) We are destined for adoption as Children of God through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of God’s will. This is the plan. Adopted as family members of God. Over this COVID holidays, I’ve been thinking about my family, none of us are perfect, every family has their quirks, we are not the same, but given room to grow. There is a family resemblance depending on which sided of the family you are talking to, but it only means that we belong. we are all included. We are all loved, we all desire the very best for each other. Our identity is not based on how we compare to each other, but on being related together and by each other’s accomplishments that add to the honor of the family; Doctor, Lawyer, Educator, Business Administrator, Artist, Therapist, Graphic Designer, Accountant, Computer Scientist, Dancer, Cook, Baker, Philosophical Theologian, Engineer. Funny, wise, silly, smart, serious, determined, time creative, organized, challenged, athletic, technical, adventurous, we are alike and different in many ways that make us a glorious family. God is the common blood that links us all together in love. From Creation, intent, design, will, forgiveness, according to a lavish grace. (10) gather up, hanai, into the Ohana of God. And now for the good part, (11) our adoption into God’s Ohana comes with an inheritance. Everything that belongs to God, we have a stake in, a shared interest. What we inherit from God, through Jesus is; love, forgiveness, grace, life, call, challenge, will, creation and the community of the people of God of which we are adopted as family. This is what God owns and bequeaths to us. It is relational, and so we need the Holy Spirit to help us, guide us, get us to do the relational things that if left for us to do on our own we would not. This is the sign and seal of the way that the people of God live, in the quirky, unique, counter to culture, not about money or power, creative, unique way, that gives glory to God. That is the argument for our adoption. APPLICATION We are loved to bits and forgiven by God with a community and family as our inheritance. What does living as God’s adopted children look like? As we talk about how we are adopted to be the family of God, there is a flip side to this that I got from an On Being pod cast, with Krista Tippet interviewing Jeff Chu who just completed writing a book for his friend Rachel Evens who died recently, this is what I got from Rachel Evens writings by Jeff Chu: Wholehearted Faith, into the world. INCARNATION Page 4: “It is nearly impossible to believe: God shrinking down to the size of a zygote, implanted in the soft lining of a woman’s womb. God growing fingers and toes. God kicking and hiccupping in utero. God inching down the birth canal and entering this world covered in blood, perhaps into the steady, waiting arms of a midwife. God crying out in hunger. God reaching for his mother’s breasts. God totally relaxed, eyes closed, his chubby little arms raised over his head in a posture of complete trust. God resting in his mother’s lap. God needed to be hanai by us. COMMUNION “On the days and nights when I believe this story that we call Christianity, I cannot entirely make sense of the storyline: God trusted God’s very self, totally and completely and in full bodily form, to the care of a woman. God needed women for survival. Before Jesus fed us with the bread and the wine, the body and the blood, Jesus himself needed to be fed, by a woman. He needed a woman to say: ‘This is my body, given for you.’” Just a couple more thoughts from this interview: the incarnation reminds me that …Our bodies are our first homes. So how do we make peace with them? Jeff Chu says: “Most of us don’t want to be the object of a cause. Most of us want to be friends. Rachel Evens also knew that she could learn from everyone…” He says by says, “being a Christian is not the result of a convincing debate, or that being a Christian means that we need to become know-it-alls.” Rather he says, “being a Christian is realizing how much of God’s beauty remains to be explored - and that the life of faith is also a life of holy curiosity.” CONCLUSION Jeff Chu concludes this interview by saying, “I want to belong. Isn’t that one of the greatest desires of every human? I don’t know that we can remain tenderhearted alone. I don’t know that we can survive alone. We weren’t built for that. We need community. We need love. We need to belong.” God needed to be hanai by us, we need to live every day hanai by God.
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