Knowing God: Chapter 19 (Part 1)

Knowing God:

Chapter 19: Sons of God (Part 1)

EMPIRE STRIKES BACK

• ? Describe your relationship with your parents?
• Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker
  • desertion
  • anger
  • betrayal
  • violence
  • provocation of evil

OT vs. NT

• Transcendence (Holiness)
  • Packer
    "the aspect of his character on which God laid most stress in the OT was his holiness."

• Immanence (Family)
  • Packer
    "Father has now become his covenant name - for the covenant which binds him to his people now stands revealed as a family covenant."

• Galatians 4: 21 - 31

• Galatians 3:26-29
  • You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.
  • Genealogies were especially important in ancient Israel because the right to hold important offices was a hereditary privilege....Early Christian preaching radically redefined genealogical descent by considering all who identified with Jesus as true, legal descendants of Abraham.

• Matthew Henry
  • Covenant of Works - legal, spirit is of bondage unto sin and death, spirit of persecution
  • Covenant of Grace - evangelical, spirit is of liberty and freedom; not liberty to sin, spirit of love
  • "Works and fruits brought forth in a man's own strength, are legal. But if arising from faith in Christ, they are evangelical."

• ? How does God's revelation of himself in the OT compare with the NT revelation?

FATHERHOOD

• Packer
  "For God intends the lives of believers to be a reflection and reproduction of Jesus' own fellowship with himself."

• Gospel of John

• ? Explain how God has made his fatherhood clear through his...?
• Authority (John 6: 35-40)
  • provider (v- 35)
  • "resolute obedience" (v- 38)
  • sustainer (v- 40)
• Affection (John 15: 7-11)
  • Jonathan Edward's affection, "strong inclinations of the soul that are manifested in thinking, feeling and acting." (v- 7, 10)
  • "love" v- 9
• Fellowship (John 16: 32-33)
  
  • internal - one substance/Holy Spirit (v- 32)
    
  • external - omnipotence & omnipresent (v- 33)
    
  • Packer, "For God intends the lives of believers to be a reflection and reproduction of Jesus' own fellowship with himself."
    
• Honor (John 17: 1-5)
  
  • exaltation/glory
    
• Packer
  "All this extends to God's adopted children. In. through and under Jesus Christ their Lord, they are ruled, loved, companied with and honored by their heavenly Father."
  

ADOPTION

• Justification

• ? You?
• Packer
  • "God's forgiveness of the past together with his acceptance for the future - is the primary and fundamental blessing of the gospel."
  • "is a forensic idea, conceived in terms of law, and viewing God as judge."
• ? What would our relationship with God be like if he stopped there?

• Adoption

• Greek
  to place a son; signifies the place and condition of a son given to one it does not naturally belong
• Packer
  "is a family idea, conceived in terms of love, and viewing God as father."
  
• Wayne Grudem
  "God could have given us justification without the privileges of adoption into his family, for he could have forgiven our sins and given us right legal standing before him without making us his children. It is important to realize this because it helps us to recognize how great are our privileges in adoption."
  

• Sermon on the Mount
  

• Christian Conduct
  
  • Matthew 5: 13-16
    
  • Packer
    ...concrete, imaginative, teaching general principles from particular instances, and seeking all the time to bring the children to appreciate and share the parents' own attitudes and view of life."
    
  • ? How does understanding Christian conduct help us understand our adoption?
    

• Christian Prayer
  
  • Matthew 6: 5-7
    
  • Packer
    "The father is always accessible to his children and is never too preoccupied to listen to what they have to say."
    
  • ? How does understanding Christian prayer help us understand our adoption?
    
    

• Life of Faith
  
  • Matthew 6: 31-34
    
  • Matthew 7: 7-11
    
  • Packer
    "following God's will at whatever cost and trusting him for the consequences...Such trust is vital; it is in truth the mainspring of the life of faith, which without it becomes a life of at least partial unbelief."
    
  • ? How does understanding the life of faith help us understand our adoption?