Life in the Family of God

What does it mean to be in the family of God? Some people believe that every individual, every person, because we're made by God, and because God is our Creator, that that means we're in the family of God. Some people believe that they are in the family of God because they've been born into a Christian home. Others believe that they're in the family of God because they've gone through some religious ritual, perhaps, and particularly baptism.

And so they feel, I am in the family of God because of that religious ritual. This subject of the family of God is a very, very important one. It's a very basic one, and I want us very simply to examine what John, the Gospel writer in his fourth Gospel, says about this important subject of how it is that we can be in the family of God. So I invite you, if you have your Bible, to turn to the fourth Gospel, the Gospel according to John, and we're going to read from chapter one, first of all. Here at Calvary, we believe that the Bible is the Word of God, that we come not to hear my opinions or my ideas, but to listen to what God says.

And it's been recorded in the sacred Scripture 2,000 years ago, but we believe because it is the Word of God, it is living, and God will speak to you today if you come with a humble heart. Here it is, John 1, verse 9. John, one of the disciples writes, the true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.

He's referring to the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the true light. He gives light, notice John says, He gives light to everyone. We believe that the message of the Gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, is a message for everyone, not particular nationalities, but is to everyone.

This true light gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. He, that is Jesus, the Word, He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, yet the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and His own people did not receive Him. But to all who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. Final text of Scripture. John is telling us that to enter the family of God, we must personally, individually, we must receive Jesus Christ. John is telling us that Jesus comes as the light of the world. That apart from the Lord Jesus Christ, we live in darkness, we're created by God, we're made in the image of God, we're to answer to God, we are accountable to God, and we find our fulfillment not in ourselves, but in living a life in accordance with God, who is our Creator.

We tend to fill our inner longings with all kinds of things, false gods, pleasures, power, ambition, wealth, comfort, and so on. And we grope around, John is giving us this picture, that apart from Jesus, who is the true light, we are in the darkness, and we grope around in the darkness of our world. In fact, John tells us, in John chapter 3 verse 19, that we love the darkness. You would say, why would someone love the darkness rather than light? John says, you love the darkness because your deeds are evil.

There is part of us which wants to exclude God from our lives, to live our own way, even though we go into the darkness and sometimes reap the consequences of our own lifestyles. And left to ourselves, here is the point, left to ourselves, we will never discover the light. And John explains, magnificently, in the prologue of his gospel, that the true light, Jesus Christ, comes into the world. Look at verse 5, John says, the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it. Oh yes, the dark is very dark, but it is not as powerful as the light.

You know that, in a dark room, you can just have a small light and that light dispels the darkness, that light is greater than darkness. And into the darkness, John is using metaphors, pictures, into the darkness of our world, that is a world without Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ comes from heaven to earth and the light shines, he says, in the darkness, verse 5, and the darkness has not overcome it. Verse 9, the true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. And so the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, the Christian gospel, is that Jesus comes to dispel our darkness.

But did you notice something quite amazing, in a sense quite surprising, if not astonishing? We read in verse 11, he, Jesus, who is the light, he comes to his own, he comes, Israel is in the spotlight today because of the horrors of Hamas, going and killing innocent women and children and taking them hostage, but our Lord Jesus Christ, when he was born, he comes to Israel. Some of us were there just earlier this year, the birthplace of our Lord, of all the places that God could have chosen. He chose that his son in his incarnation, when the word becomes flesh, and when God in his son, Jesus Christ, enters into space and time, he chooses that he comes to Israel, to the nation of Israel 2,000 years ago. So says John, he came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. And we know that historically, that he is rejected, he is crucified, he is shunned, he is hated.

Why? Because we love the darkness. Is that true today? Of course it is, still true today, that we prefer, don't we even in this country, a so-called Christian country, although we can hardly call it a Christian country today, when we see what's happening, but in this country, in our own country, in our own lives, that people prefer their own lifestyle. They prefer their own choices, rather than coming to the light.

Are you one of these individuals? You think, well, I'm going to live my own life, I'm going to make my own way. Perhaps you've been raised in a Christian church, perhaps you have Christian parents, but somehow you think you know better.

And you prefer your own life and your own lifestyle. Into this dark world, the light shines. Verse 5, the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. Jesus is going to make a very powerful statement later in the Gospel in chapter 8, verse 12, when he says, I am the light of the world.

Notice that. Not just the light of Israel, he is that. He's the light of the world. Only one who is God could make such a claim. For any mere man to make that claim is absurd, is ridiculous. We could say we influence perhaps our family and friends, but which man, which woman, however charismatic, however gifted, however intellectual, however able, could say I am the light of the world.

But that's the claim by Jesus Christ, because he's God. He says, I'm the light of the world. He who follows me shall not walk in the darkness, but will have the light of life. And those of us who are following Jesus Christ, who have been following Him for some time understand this, that the closer we are to Jesus Christ, the more we're in the light. The further we are from the Lord, the more we go our own way, the more we're observed by our own little world in our tiny little kingdom, we get increasingly in the dark.

But this is the claim. That if you follow Jesus Christ, you will not walk in the darkness, but you'll have the light of life. That Jesus invades the darkness and dispels it. You say, well, John, you don't need to convince me about my dark life. I've really messed up my life.

My life is very difficult. Here's the good news of the Gospel. However dark your life, whatever mess you've made of your life, whatever it is, this light, this supernatural light, is brighter, is stronger, is more enduring, because it is an eternal light. It's a supernatural light. It's the light of God. This is not a light manufactured by us.

This is not a life which is self-generated. This is not the light that we find by looking within and discovering the path of enlightenment for our own life, far from it. This is a light that comes from God Himself and shines right into our hearts, right into our souls, and dispels the darkness as our sins are forgiven. How is it possible then for those who are in the dark, as we all are, to receive this eternal life and light? We read it. To all, verse 12, to all, the light comes to all, to all who did receive Him.

Some don't, some still don't. But to those who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right, there it is, to become children of God. That is, when I receive Jesus Christ, the light of the world, I become His child. I am to receive Him, John is saying. I'm to believe in His name. And it's only those who receive Him.

It's only those who believe in His name, who have a personal relationship with the living Christ, who are given the right to become children of God. And John's gospel is written. He tells us at the end of his gospel, he says that you may believe.

John writes 21 chapters. He talks about Jesus Christ. He tells us some of the mighty things that He did. He tells us of His great statements, the I am statements. He tells them of His death, of His burial, and His resurrection. And he says, I have written these that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in His name. See, John pictures us in the darkness.

He pictures us in death, headed for death. And Jesus comes from outside of us, from heaven to earth, into our world, into our neighborhood. And He brings the light, and He brings life so that He says, as many as received Him. To those who believe in His name, He gave the right to become children of God. The person who hears His Word, who believes Him, who sent Me, Jesus says, has present tense eternal life. Now this means, doesn't it, that if you're going to be a child of God, if that darkness of your life, if that death is to be dispelled, if you're to be given eternal life, it's only going to come through receiving Jesus Christ. See, the Gospel calls for a personal commitment. It calls for understanding, that's true. But it calls for a response, a response of receiving Christ, of embracing Christ, of believing in His name.

Now you say, how can this come about? John tells us, verse 13, let me read verse 12 again. To all who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. This new life, this new light is not self-generated. John tells us particularly, it doesn't come from a blood heritage. I had Christian parents for which I'm thankful, but my eternal life, my eternal destiny, the dispelling of the darkness of my life did not come because I was born in Monroe into a Christian family. Absolutely not. It's not of blood, not something you inherit.

You're proud of your family, you can trace it a way back to your roots in Scotland, that's wonderful. That doesn't get you into heaven. It's not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, not something that you do, nor of the will of man. It's not something you wake up and say, I want to be a follower of Jesus.

That's going to do it. No, John says it is of God. It is being born of God. We're dealing with something which is supernatural. We're dealing with something which is not self-generated.

It's not something that I can give to you, or your parents, or your best friend, or your children. This is a supernatural encounter with the living Christ, who died for our sins, was buried, and rose again. And so I have to ask you, have you ever had a supernatural encounter with the Lord Jesus Christ? You say, how does this come about? Well John helps us with this in chapter three, if you turn there in your Bibles. We'll look a little closer at this new birth, because we have this wonderful dialogue between a religious man, a man called Nicodemus, and the Lord Himself.

And this will help us greatly in understanding what this new birth is. How can I be born into the family of God? It doesn't come through the church. It doesn't come through your parents. It doesn't come through baptism.

How does it come about? John 3, we'll learn that to enter the kingdom of God, you must be born again. You must be born from above. You need a new birth. You were born into a particular family, physically. Now you're going to be born again spiritually, so you can be born into the family of God. You say, I'm not sure if I get it.

Let's read. John 3 verse 1. Now there's a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews.

This man came to Jesus by night and said, Rabbi, we know that you're teaching from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him. Jesus answered him, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus said to him, how can a man be born when he's old?

Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born? Jesus answered, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again.

The wind blows where it wishes and you hear it sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit. Nicodemus said to him, how can these things be? Jesus answered him, are you the teacher of Israel?

And yet you do not understand these things. Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know and bear witness to what we have seen, but you do not receive our testimony. Here is a man, a religious man, a ruler, comes to Jesus by night, perhaps in secret, perhaps because he's so busy, but Jesus meets him at night. And we have this wonderful, intriguing, fascinating dialogue between Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, and Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

And Jesus is saying to this man, and this man is taken aback by it, he can't really understand it. Jesus is saying to him, Nicodemus, you must be born again. In fact, if you're not born again, you will not see the kingdom of God. Unless you're born again, Nicodemus, you will not enter the kingdom of God. And so, Nicodemus, this religious man, this well-educated man, well thought of in the community, he is faced with the most important issue of human existence, will he or will he not enter the kingdom of God?

Could you think of a more important issue than that? Now, I'm assuming you believe in God, and that God is King, and that Jesus Christ is King of kings and Lord of lords, and that He has a kingdom of which He is the King and the ruler. If that is the case, the most important question which I face and you face is, will I be in that kingdom? Because that kingdom, unlike all human kingdoms, will last for all of eternity.

It will never end. It is endless in its existence, and Nicodemus then is faced with this question, is he right with God? When he dies, is he going to be in that kingdom? Does he have the assurance of eternal life?

He's got education. He knows the Torah, the Old Testament Scriptures. But Jesus goes right to the heart of the matter and says yes. When he comes to Jesus and in a sense says, you know, we know that God must be with you, for no one can do the miracles that you do unless God is with them.

And Jesus says, all right, in a sense, I'm putting you outside. Here's the question for you, Nicodemus. You must be born again.

Now can I say this? If a religious man like Nicodemus, who was a ruler, who was a moral man, who I'm sure was a good man, seemed to be a sincere seeker of truth, if he needed to be born again, how much more so the rest of us? And we also learn from the teaching of Jesus that this new birth, this concept of being born again, is not an optional extra for some religious fanatics. You say, well, I've heard this expression born again and I know so-and-so is a bit of a Jesus freak.

I don't know if I want to be like that. This is not for some fringe people. This is central to the good news. This is central to your spiritual destiny. Unless you are born again, you will not enter the kingdom of God.

You may come from a good home. You may be very sincere, but unless you're born again, you will not enter the kingdom of God. If you want to enter heaven, it's essential that you listen to Jesus, who not only is a prophet, He's the one who comes from heaven to earth. John is telling us right at the beginning of his prologue that this one is God, that the Word was with God and the Word was God.

This is God. This is God's Word to us through His Son, still speaking to us through the living, inspired Word of God. And the message to us today is this, to enter the family of God, you must be born again. And Jesus is saying, physical life, physical endeavor cannot produce spiritual life. Physical life only produces physical life. That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. The physical reality and the spiritual reality, you might say the physical world and the spiritual world are different.

Two entirely different dimensions of life. So what you can do, however accomplished you are, is not really relevant to the spiritual. That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. Human effort, here's the point, religion, sincerity, morality, good works, personal goodness are all impressive at the human level, but they can never ever produce spiritual or eternal life. This is hard for us, isn't it? We think we can work our way to God. We think if we do the right thing, we can somehow get there. No, however hard we try, we can't make it on our own. This new birth, says Jesus, as recorded in John 1, is not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

You can't make it on your own. For a few years as my mother's mother, my maternal grandfather aged, my maternal grandmother aged, she came to live with us in our home in Scotland. Most of that time I was at home, I was married, but she lived for a few years with us before she died.

And she was quite a character. She could never drive, but most days she would walk from our house through the park, up to the town, and do a little shopping. She loved apples, so one day she's walking along the main street in the town where we lived in Scotland.

And there's not big supermarkets, these are small stores, and she comes to a store or a shop as we call them, that sells fruit and vegetables and so on. And right in the window, there are these beautiful, shiny, red apples. And she thought, these look absolutely superb. So she went in to the store and ordered a few of these shiny apples. And the young woman, instead of going to the window and taking the apples there, went down, took some apples out of the box, and said to my grandmother, there you are. And my grandmother didn't like the look of them. And said, these are not what I want.

I want the ones in the window. The red apples. And the shop assistant, looking at this old woman with her very broad Scottish accent, we were living in central Scotland, she came from the north, so the assistant would know that she came from a different part of the world. And sort of in a patronizing way, not knowing my grandmother obviously, said, oh my dear, these are the same apples.

It's just the ones in the window have a better shine on them. And my grandmother said, listen, I may be an old woman, but I know this. However much you shine green apples, you won't change them into red apples. She came and told us the story. She didn't think it was that funny.

We found this hilarious, my grandmother giving the shop assistant a lesson. The point I'm making is this, you can't change your own life. You cannot get out of your own darkness. You cannot go through some, even spiritual experience, self-induced, self-perpetrated, and achieve eternal life. Doing the best you can, trying your hardest, hoping for your best, will never ever get you into heaven.

Why? To get into heaven, to enter the kingdom of God, you need eternal life. And the only way to get this spiritual life, to be born into the family of God, is through this spiritual life. God gives you physical life, only God can give you physical life, and only God can give a spiritual life. This new birth is a spiritual birth, a spiritual rebirth, a birth from above. This expression, born again, could also be translated born from above. Spiritual life coming from the risen Christ who's conquered death into our hearts as we personally place our trust in Him. It's not something that you do, but being born again is something that God does in us. God gives us new life, His life. He radically changes us from the inside out. Religion works from the outside, trying to change the inner in. The Christian message, the Christian faith is not outside coming in, but it is a change from the inside by God, which radically changes all of life. It's not the result of you changing your life.

It's not the result of you cleaning up your act. It's a gift of God, a gift of God's amazing grace, and it comes, as John tells us, through the receiving Jesus Christ. To help us understand, Jesus gives us an illustration.

Here it is. Nicodemus finds this difficult. You're talking about being born again, Rabbi. I mean, have I got to go to my mother's womb a second time?

I mean, this sounds ridiculous. Jesus says, no, you got all wrong. I'm talking about something spiritual. And He gives an illustration which Nicodemus would have known from the Old Testament. It comes from Numbers chapter one, and he says here in verse 14 of John 3, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life. Now, Nicodemus knew the Old Testament Scriptures. He had read Numbers 21 as we know it from the Torah.

In Numbers chapter 21, what happens? The Israelites in the desert, before they reach the promised land, they rebel against God, and they rebel against Moses. They are cantankerous.

Not only are they cantankerous, they are in rebellion. And in judgment, God sends fiery snakes among the people, and they bite the people so that many of them die. The people then, in great distress, as they see their friends and family dying, they come to Moses, and they say, Moses, you've got to intercede for us. We have sinned.

We've done wrong. And you must remove these snakes from us. And the Lord commands Moses to do something, which to us sounds very foolish, but which was going to test the faith of the people. He commands Moses to make a snake and set it on a pole. A snake made of bronze or copper. Make that snake, put it on a pole, Moses. And here is the message to the people. Anyone and everyone who is bitten by this snake, if they look to that pole, if they look to that bronze snake, they will be healed.

They are to accept God's provision. A strange cure, you might say. But the snake bite, they couldn't cure themselves. No doctor. There was no antidote for the — from the venom given by the snake.

They were totally helpless to save themselves. But here was God's remedy. If you look up to that snake, you will be cured. Those who looked up were cured.

The message was look and live. Those who thought this was ridiculous, those who didn't look up died from the snake bite. Now says Jesus to Nicodemus, you know that story from the Old Testament, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up. When was the Son of Man lifted up? On the cross.

He's lifted up in the cross that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life. All of us have been bitten by the snake, by the serpent, our enemy. All of us are dying. The wages of sin is death.

We've all sinned. We're all going to die left to ourselves. There is no cure to be found in ourselves. Our good works of religion cannot cure us.

What we need is new life, something from outside of ourselves. And this is what God in His incredible love has provided in His Son, Jesus Christ, who comes not to condemn us, but to save us. And the message is this. If you look up to Christ, the one who died for your sins, the one who was buried, the one who was raised again, if you look to Him, you will be saved. If you receive Him, this wonderful experience of regeneration, of receiving His life, His very life, the one who conquered death, alive forevermore, this is the promise that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life.

Will you look to Christ? And then we have the best known verse in the Bible that we've already sung about. A verse I learned as a little boy, a verse that many of you learned as little children. This was the verse I preached when I candidated here almost 18 years ago.

In a sense, it's my favorite verse. What does it say? Think of the context. Context of the new birth.

The context of the serpent on the pole. The context, if you look, if you believe in Him, you will have eternal life for God. So loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life. Do you hear it?

Do you believe it? Will you look to Christ? You'll never get into heaven any other way. This is the way that God in His great love sees our darkness, sees the mess that we've made of our life, knows our inability by ourselves to reach Him, our holy God. But in great love, He sends His Son Jesus, which means Savior. And if you believe in Him, if you look to Him, you'll never perish but have everlasting life. This is the love of God. For you, as we pray, if you've never done it, open your heart and receive Christ. To as many as received Him, to those who believe in His name, He gave the right to become children of God.

Listen. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. Will you bow in prayer? And if you've never received Christ, will you look to Him? He's lifted up on the cross. Do you see Him? Do you see Him buried?

Do you see Him risen from the dead as a resurrection unto life, that the one who believes in Him will never die but will live forever? And say, I trust you as my Savior. I repent of my darkness and of my sin. Come and save me and cleanse me. The promise is this, that those who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ shall be saved. I'm asking you to look to Christ, to receive Him, to believe in Him.

Will you do that right now? Our Father and our God and the holiness of this moment, as we're faced with eternal reality of our own eternal destiny, I pray that every single one of us here, our children, our students, all of us, will look to Christ. Thank You for that amazing love that we don't deserve, that grace that You so loved the world that You gave Your only Son, Your unique Son. We believe in Him. We trust Him. Even now, Father, the darkness of lives, may that be dispelled as many place their trust in Christ. We thank You that in Him, there is forgiveness of sins. There's eternal life.

There's joy. And as we go through life, it's not us doing things, but it is the life of Christ living in us. Bless us. Have mercy upon us, we pray in Christ's name. Amen.