Children of God

Galatians 3:26 “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.”

Being a son is the highest stature God has promised us. This position is not just for enjoyment and authority but a huge responsibility to hold. Here in this verse, despite their acceptance of traditions along with grace and Paul’s disappointment over them, Paul still calls all of them as Sons of God. This is an encouragement to us. Baptism brings us to a protection that we are sons who God would discipline.

This is made possible only because we are baptized into Christ and have put on Christ. Baptism is a representation of our faith because, we believe in Him to give us a new life and submit ourselves completely allowing all our previous life to die. This unlimited trust only makes us as sons. Baptism into Christ means that we have agreed to be cleansed and are entering into Christ Himself. The verse says that all who were baptized had put on Christ. There were no exemptions here. This commitment of putting on Christ is required during baptism. Otherwise, it becomes vain.

Since we had put on Christ, we become heirs to the Father. The Father looks us as joint partners with His Son for the kingdom. By calling us Abraham’s true seed in Chapter 3:16, God goes further into clarifying that the whole Jewish kingdom, its laws, promises, prophesies were all given to prepare way for Christ to come. That’s why Jesus was born under the law (Galatians 4:4). This birth is called as fullness of time which means that everything else was just preparing for this climax. Jesus is this important to our faith and life. Similar to Noah’s time, God had rejected everybody and adopted people who cling on to Jesus Christ.

Reading verses 4 & 5 together, we can see that Jesus was born with so simplicity so that He could overcome the world and we are just sharing His victory. Jesus was born under the law to redeem those who are under the law. In 3:13 we read that He became a curse so that we could be redeemed from the curse. The role Jesus Christ plays for our redemption is that he takes up every hindrance into Himself and makes way for us to just share His inheritance.

Verse 4:6 puts more light into this. The reason for the most precious gift we can ever receive, that is the Holy Spirit, is that God wants us to cry out to Him as “Abba Father”. We can see this again in Romans 8:15, 16. The Holy Spirit bears witnesses to both us and the Father. A true and very important guidance of the Holy Spirit is a strong assurance of inheritance.

In Gal 4:1,2 and 3, we how our relationship as a son may not be visible to others and even us. But faith makes us sons. The only link between the offspring and is faith. The Holy Spirit gives us the assurance, comfort and guidance but faith in the way towards this. That’s why in verse 6, it is mentioned that the Spirit was given after we became sons. So, when the time had come, we are redeemed from all bondage both sin and traditions. So, it is required for us to come out of all bondages and claim our freedom and so, do everything in freedom with God.

We are not sons by birth, but sons by adoption. Unlike the world claims that everybody is a son of God, a true relationship starts only by faith. God takes responsibility as a Father only after faith sprouts out. This adoption does not apply for Non-Jews alone as Paul includes himself in verse 5. John 1:12 says that we are given the right to become sons. In Ephesians 1:5 we see how great His will is that we had already determined all of us as sons. The decision was that everybody who comes through Jesus are His sons.

The higher emphasis on the promotion as sons is seen in verses 21 to 28. Where if we think we are sons by tradition, family or other parameters, we are compared with the situation of Ishmael. Faith should be the only parameter in our love with Christ. The Church is compared with Issac and was born out of bondage and is free. Verse 23 says that the law was born according to the flesh, which means that it’s only purpose was to keep the flesh in purity. But the promise given to us is that all our spirit, soul and body should be holy and acceptable as sons. For that stature, we need to become sons.