Who are God's Children Now?

“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.

“Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. You know that he appeared in order to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him. Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous. Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. 

“No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God's seed abides in him; and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God. By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.” (1 John 3:1-10 ESV)

If we are truly born of God, born of the Spirit of God, and if we are truly God’s children, by spiritual birth, then we have been crucified with Christ in death to sin, and we have been raised with Christ to walk in newness of life in him, no longer to live as slaves to sin, but as slaves to God and to his righteousness. Sin, therefore, is no longer to be what we practice. For if sin is what we obey, and not righteousness, and not walks of obedience to the Lord, then we don’t really know God, we are not born of God, but we are of the devil, and so we do not have eternal life with God.

Romans 6:1-23; 1 John 1:5-10; 1 John 2:3-6; 1 John 3:4-10; Luke 9:23-26

Now this does not make us perfect people. We are still capable of sin, and we still have the propensity to sin, and we are still tempted to sin, so we may, sometimes, sin against the Lord, but not deliberately and habitually, not if we are true children of God. But if we do sin, Jesus Christ is our advocate to God the Father for those for whom sin is not their practice, but righteousness and holy living and walks of obedience to the Lord is what they practice (1 John 2:1-2; 1 John 1:5-10; 1 John 2:3-6; 1 John 3:4-10). 

If we are true followers of Jesus Christ, and not in lip service only, we are going to live lives which are separate (unlike, different) from the world (from the ungodly) because we are in the process of being conformed by God to the likeness of character of Jesus Christ. For this is what it means to be holy as God is holy, and to be holy in all our conduct (1 Peter 1:13-16). And so the ungodly of this world, and including within the gatherings of what are called “churches,” will not receive us as their own. And that is because they don’t know Jesus Christ in truth and in righteousness.

But we should not be comfortable within the gatherings of the ungodly, anyway, because they live a different lifestyle than what we should be living as followers of Christ. And many professers of faith in Jesus Christ, sadly so, are living much like the ungodly do to where it is barely distinguishable now between the church and the world. For so much of what is called “church,” at least here in America, is being patterned after the ways of the world in order to attract the people of the world to their gatherings. And so they have also altered the gospel message to make it more acceptable to the ungodly.

But the truth of the gospel is what Jesus Christ taught, and what his NT apostles taught, when taught in their proper context. But so many people today are distorting and/or they are accepting a distorted gospel of Christ message which is not the message being taught to us here in 1 John and in the rest of the New Testament. And the primary way in which it is being distorted, it appears, is by them removing Scriptures from their context and teaching them outside that context, and distorting them to make them say what they do not say if they are taught in their proper context.

So, just because someone quotes a Scripture to you, it doesn’t mean that they are quoting it in the proper context or that they are applying it in the right way to our lives. So it is a good practice for us to read Scriptures in their full context so that we don’t end up misinterpreting and misapplying them to our lives. For the truth of the gospel is not that we can just pray a prayer or acknowledge what Jesus did for us on that cross and now all our sins are forgiven, and heaven is our destiny, but regardless of how we live.

For it isn’t just the book of 1 John that spells out for us what it means to be of genuine faith in Jesus Christ. All throughout the New Testament we are taught that faith which saves dies with Christ to sin, not just once, but in daily practice, it follows Jesus Christ in walks of obedience to his commands, and it walks in holiness and in righteousness in moral purity, honesty, uprightness, and faithfulness, and no longer in deliberate and habitual sin against the Lord Jesus. And if this is not our practice, and never has been our practice, then we are not of genuine faith and relationship with Christ.

[Matt 7:21-23; Lu 9:23-26; John 1:12-13; John 6:44; John 10:27-30; Acts 26:18; Rom 2:6-8; Rom 6:1-23; Rom 8:1-14; Rom 12:1-2; 1 Co 6:9-10,19-20; 1 Co 10:1-22; 2 Co 5:10,15,21; Gal 5:16-24; Gal 6:7-8; Eph 2:8-10; Eph 4:17-32; Eph 5:3-6; Col 1:21-23; Col 3:1-17; Titus 2:11-14; 1 Jn 1:5-10; 1 Jn 2:3-6,24-25; 1 Jn 3:4-10; 1 Peter 1:15; 1 Pet 2:24; Heb 3:1-19; Heb 4:1-13; Heb 10:23-31; Hebrews 12:1-2; Rev 21:8,27; Rev 22:14-15]

Near the Cross  

Hymn lyrics by Fanny J. Crosby, 1869

Music by William H. Doane, 1869 

Jesus, keep me near the cross; 

There a precious fountain, 

Free to all, a healing stream, 

Flows from Calvary's mountain. 

Near the cross, a trembling soul, 

Love and mercy found me; 

There the bright and morning star 

Sheds its beams around me. 

 

Near the cross! O Lamb of God, 

Bring its scenes before me; 

Help me walk from day to day 

With its shadow o'er me. 

Near the cross I'll watch and wait, 

Hoping, trusting ever, 

Till I reach the golden strand 

Just beyond the river. 

In the cross, in the cross, 

Be my glory ever, 

Till my raptured soul shall find 

Rest beyond the river.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5gong-PNmY

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