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into His family, transferred from a state of sin and misery to a state of excellency
[and] dignity, writes Watson. It were much for God to take a clod of dust and make it a
star; it is more for God to take a piece of clay and sin and adopt it for his heir.
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Adoption in the time of the apostle John usually took place in adolescence or
adulthood, not infancy. Under Roman law, adoption was a legal act by which a man
chose someone outside of the family to be an heir to his inheritance. Likewise, believers
become children of God through the gracious act of God the Father who chooses them to
be His heirs and joint heirs with Christ.
William Ames says there are four differences between human and divine
adoption:
Human adoption relates to a person, who, as a stranger, has no right to the inheritance except
through adoption. But believers, though by natural birth they have no right to the inheritance of
life, are given it because of rebirth, faith, and justification.
Human adoption is only an outward designation and bestowal of external things. But divine
adoption is so real a relationship that it is based on an inward action and the communications of a
new inner life.
Human adoption was introduced when there were no, or too few, natural sons. But divine
adoption is not from any want but from abundant goodness, whereby a likeness of a natural son
and mystical union is given to the adopted sons.
The human adoption is ordained so that the son may succeed the father in the inheritance. But
divine adoption is not ordained for succession, but for participation in the inheritance assigned.
Both the Father and his first-begotten Son live forever and this admits no succession.
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How astonishing it is that, unlike people`s heirs who don`t share their estates with
their friends, we as God`s adopted children share the same privileges that belong to
God`s only-begotten Son! The Puritans reveled in what Christ prays in John 17:23:
...and hast love them, as thou hast loved me.
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This love is the essence of God`s
fatherhood. It shows us how far God is willing to go to reconcile us to Himself.
How great is the love the Father has lavished on us that we should be called
children of God (1 John 3:1)--we who deserve His judgment, dethroned Him from our
lives, spurned His love, and defied His laws. Here, surely, is the great assurance of the
child of God, that God the Father loved him when he was bound for hell. How wonderful
is the assurance of the Father`s words: I have loved thee with an everlasting love (Jer.
31:3).
Love and communion with God lie at the heart of adoption, according to John
Owen. Owen listed five elements of adoption, which Sinclair Ferguson summarizes as
follows: (1) that the person first belongs to another family; (2) that there is a family to