Receive Jesus to Be Children of God

This morning, We're gonna hear the third message in our Advent series from John's prologue. And the message is receive Jesus to receive God's will for your life. Receive Jesus to receive God's will for your life. In the passage, we're gonna see two rejections and two great blessings we have when we receive Jesus. The sermon text is 10 to 13, but I want to go back up to verse 9, where Daniel concluded last week, because it really is a transitional text. So we see there,

the true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.

The light is He who is life. He shines in the darkness. He was prophesied beforehand. The light is one of the same word who created all things. He's the light, which is a powerful picture of his revealing power and life-giving power. He's the light who came into the world.

Now this is where we need to make sure we know how to do a word study properly, because the world actually has two different references. John describes the world in his letter as the things that are sinful. pride of life and the lust of the flesh, that is not how he's defining the world here. Because the world as made by God is good. This is the created good cosmos. This is the created good material world, not the sinful world. The good world that is described in Genesis 1 and 2. But now darkness in verse five, that is referring to sin. That is referring to the evil twisted ideas and actions of man. Here the true light, who gives light to everyone, that is reveals God's truth to everyone. He was coming into our world that's filled with darkness. And that's where our sermon text picks up in verse 10.

Jesus, the unknown creator

Our first point, Jesus, The unknown creator. The unknown creator. Here are the three phrases that we have to just put together because so much truth is packed into these three declarations.

He was in the world. The world was made through him, yet the world did not know him.

He was in the world. Now again, because of context, and we recognize who he is, the light and the word that created, we've already seen that in John 1, verse 1. But just to make sure we understand how significant this is, he was in the world. Well, what world? The world was made through him. Making sure, as explicit as it can be, God has come down into his creation. The maker is with his world. The world that was made through him, he now participates in. The creator is in his creation. The maker among his handiwork. Jesus, the word, that declaration that he's the creator, is now among us. And he's come with the power of creation to renew us.

This is fascinating to consider because it challenges all of our categories. The eternal infinite, holy, perfect being has added to himself a finite material that he created. And then he lives among his finite material world. The one who was in the beginning before time has now entered time. The one who made the sun and the moon and ordered our days is now ordered by those same created spheres. He who upholds the planet and move the waters to provide earth. He walks upon that land and depends upon its vegetation. God who creates and sustains everything now depends upon the things he upholds.

It's important for us to have a right theology here of God. He is not distant from his creation. That's deism. But he is also not equal with his creation. That's pantheism or panentheism. We need to make sure he's not so transcendent, he's distant and far away and doesn't care, and he's not so eminent that it's exactly like us. But it's pretty incredible. The holy creator promised himself to his world to come to that world.

Well, the third phrase is what really should startle us. It's amazing to consider the creator would come into his own world that he created, but that third phrase, yet the world did not know him. Really, the word yet is the same word as and, but yet is a right translation because it's emphasizing the change of trajectory here. The operative word is not. Not. And this just emphasizes a bold absurdity. He who made the world came into that world and the world did not know him. They didn't recognize him. They didn't acknowledge him.

Now, at some level, let's be clear that the primary agents of the world are the image bearers God put into the world to hear him, to know him, to reflect him, to glorify him. So primarily, this is us. It's the entire world, but we had a very important role in this world, and we did not know him. That's supposed to be astonishing versus absurdity.

Let me be very clear. There is a secret Messiah motif. Jesus did come as the great incognito. There was a hiddenness to his coming. But his creation should have known him, should have recognized him.

Imagine one day your child not recognizing you. Sadly, we walk through this with a number of our elderly members or families, the devastating effects of dementia or Alzheimer's. It's just one of the most horrible, painful consequences of the fall. the not being able to recognize loved ones. It's frustrating for those who love them because you're constantly trying to help build that memory back and seeing the painful effects of sin on the mind and the heart, but also from their perspective, especially those when they start realizing they're losing those memories, how terrifying it is for them.

If you ever walk through that with someone, how much more The creation not knowing the great holy creator. Having dulled minds and twisted hearts to not be able to see the one who spoke everything into existence and know him.

Jesus is the creator and he is not recognized when we are left to our own sin. Important here for all human beings, you will only be the most true and happy human being you can be when you know God, your creator. The devastating effects of not knowing the creator is you don't know who you are yet because you're supposed to be imaging him. That is the most significant declaration for all humans, to know him and be able to image him, reflect him, You cannot truly be a happy, full human being without knowing God so that you know who you are living under and for.

This is where the effects of sin, it dulls all of our senses, especially our mind, our hearts. That's why Jesus came down to earth anyway. to untie the sinful knots in our hearts, to enlighten our minds, to renew our hearts so that we would know him, our God and creator.

Jesus, the rejected promise

So that's the first rejection. It's the first absurdity, the creator coming to his creation and yet they do not know him. There's a second rejection in verse 11. Jesus, the rejected promise. Jesus, the rejected promise.

He came to his own and his own people did not receive him.

Now, there's some loaded statements here. His own people, that's referring to Israel. That's referring to the promised people of Yahweh. The creator of all is now referring himself more directly to, as Yahweh, the promise-making God, the covenant God, who has tied himself directly to Israel. And he's come to his own people, Israel, and they did not receive him.

We go back into the Old Covenant, the Old Testament. Yahweh began making promises to a specific people because through that specific people, the one Savior was going to come. The covenant is summarized as,

I will be your God and you will be my people.

He makes them holy. He commits himself to them. It really begins with Abraham. Abraham is promised he will be blessed and blessed and blessed. And the significant blessing is all tied to a son who will be born. Isaac is the first fulfillment, but not the true fulfillment. Jesus is the final son.

Yahweh promised himself to be with his people, and we see this most specifically in Exodus. When enslaved and abused by the Egyptians, Israel cries out to God, and he promises himself to them.

I will be your God, and you will be my people. I will be with you, and I will deliver you.

And that language is going to be picked up in next week's text. Verse 14, the word who became flesh dwells with his people.

Yahweh promised himself to David that one day, one son of David, who is the same one son of Abraham, he will sit on the throne and rule over God's people forever. And Jesus makes it clear he is this son. We'll see this soon in Matthew 22 as Jesus refers to Psalm 110 as he is the son of David who is his own Lord. Or you could go in John and see how he says this when he declares, I am, a reference to Yahweh, the good shepherd.

The people of Israel, God's own people, that he took for his own possession, his own treasured possession, to make them holy, to promise himself to them. The only thing that makes them unique is that God promised himself to them. God gave them his promise, his word, his law. He chose his people to be his people on the earth among all the peoples. And now, the promised son, he kept repeating to them. Yahweh himself, they did not receive him. And the absurdity here is greater because God has been speaking directly to this people. He's given them his word over and over again. They should have been recognizing him and ready to receive him. We just sang of how they should have had expectant hearts as we sang,

come thou long-expected Jesus.

Jesus says he knows his own and his own people know his voice. Well, here, the people he promised himself to and now has come to, They do not receive him. They reject him.

Now, let's be clear. All the disciples are Jewish. John the Baptist, Jewish. Many of the early church disciples, the apostles, they're all Israelites. Not every single Israelite rejected Jesus, but most of the religious leaders did. Those who are responsible for having the text of God, the word of God, were supposed to be leading God's people to recognize him, but instead they planned to destroy him and they crucified him. The most significant thing here is Yahweh has fulfilled his promise. He is with his people in the most direct and intimate and clear way, and yet they did not receive him.

This morning we consider just the power of what God has done and how every human being did not know him, and his own people didn't receive him. This morning, I pray you'll long to hear him. Don't take for granted the great blessing that we know the God who speaks, the God who has told us who he is, the God who has come to us in our own words and actions to know who he is.

As we take up his word and we hear it and we read it, if you have a hard time hearing God, reading God, his word, there's an important diagnosis. See much of what I do in pastoral ministry is communication counseling. Sometimes somebody is hearing something the wrong way or they're saying it the wrong way. It's very important to understand that when it comes to God, the problem is always on our end. If we have a hard time hearing God, it's us. He is the great communicator. He is the true perfect light. He puts together the greatest sentences with all the right words and with great power his word comes. If there's something that we're not hearing it, the prayer is God help me here. Fix whatever's wrong with my ears, my mind, my heart. It's a simple diagnosis. If you're not hearing God, pray that he would help you hear him. It isn't that he's mute. He speaks.

Christian related, if you're not hearing him, I just challenge you, especially during this season, busyness is your enemy. Busyness is your enemy. Repenting of being so busy, you cannot be a fully committed disciple of Jesus Christ. Be busy with God's people. Be active, seeking to know him and make him known.

Last thing I wanna mention here with this text is that he did come and they did not know him. He will come again and there will be no misunderstanding of who he is. There will be no incognito. When he comes again, it will be with glory and power and light that all will see, that all will bow down to. Those who believed in him will be saved, and those who reject him will be condemned and judged. Believe in him. He will come again and there will be no misunderstanding.

Receive him to be children of God

The second half of our text, verse 12 and 13. Now the call to receive. The description of what is received versus rejection, but we're gonna hear the call to receive. First, receive him to be children of God. Verse 12, significant conjunction, but, unlike those who do not know him, 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.

Important, some did receive him. It's very important how he makes it clear The mass world, they reject him, they don't recognize him, but those who do receive him receive his life, his light. Notice how receiving him is equated directly with who received him are also those who believed in his name.

This is the only way to have any blessing in Jesus Christ. The only way to receive Jesus is faith in Jesus. The equation is just obvious. The only way to have any blessing in Christ is by faith.

We must make something very clear. God's salvation is very exclusive. It is only in Christ and only in his name. And it's only by faith. Salvation is only in Christ and only by faith. It's universal in that you receive every part of that salvation. You receive all the blessings of salvation, but the exclusivity is that it must be faith in Him, and that's the only way to receive Him and all of His blessings.

Now, here, the specific, you must believe in His name, well, His name represents Him. Jesus, that means Yahweh saves. The Word of God, the God who created you and has come down to recreate you, the Prince of Peace, the Good Shepherd, there's many names, but we'll just stick with Jesus. The name represents who he is.

And the reason there's no salvation outside of Jesus, the reason you must believe in his name, there's no other promised one. He is the one child promised from the very beginning of the fall that would save us. There's no other God. There's no other salvation. He is the only son who can give you the right to be sons. He is the only perfect man who died for sinners so they can be forgiven. He's the only one who's raised from the dead to give you new life. He's the only son who sits at the right hand of the father so that we can know God as father and enjoy him as father.

Christian, this must be an exclusive claim. There is salvation only in the name of Jesus and only by faith. Anyone who receives Jesus must believe in him. By faith you are saved.

Now let's be very clear, faith is not mere knowledge as if a simple intellectual recognition. You must believe in the truth, but it's not simple intellectual recognition. Faith is not mere acceptance or agreeing with some ideas. Faith is seeking God, his salvation, seeing how his light shines in your darkness and wanting to turn away from that darkness and turn to his light. Faith in Jesus means turning to him in trust, allegiance, love. It's directional. Faith and repentance must go hand in hand. In order to turn to God, you must turn away from your own rule and your own sin. It includes truth, it includes facts. Jesus came and was born a virgin, died on the cross for sinners, rose again, He will return. He is a son of God, the new Adam. You must believe in him and it is an allegiance of faith.

The doctrine of adoption

Notice here, John tells us what he gives us when we receive him and believe in him.

He gave the right to become children of God.

We are given the right to be children of God. He authorizes it. You become a certified, authentic, real child of God. This is one of the most important declarations you can understand as a Christian. We call this the doctrine of adoption.

Let's just walk through and think through what this means in light of the text. First, this is by grace. It's not something we deserve. The end declaration, look at the last declaration there of 13. It is not by the blood or the will of flesh or the will of men, it's but by the will of God. It is God's gracious will that we are adopted. You are not born by the blood of your family into the blessings of Christ. You are only born again into those blessings. You're born again by the will God, it is his gracious choice to lift us up into his family.

You're born again and adopted by the will of God and it's demonstrated by your faith. Those two things must go hand in hand. Children of the church, we hold out Christ to you that you would believe. You are not saved by your parents' faith. You're not saved by being born in the right family. You're saved by grace alone, by faith alone. You become a child of God only by believing in Jesus Christ.

And this is kind of fun. When you believe in Jesus, you become spiritual brothers with your parents. That's a fun dynamic to wrestle with. You still honor your parents. You enjoy fellowship as fellow siblings in the household of God with your parents and parents with your children. It's quite fascinating to think about how God develops and designs that dynamic.

Second, we're adopted by the will of the Father in the name of the Son being sealed by the Spirit. See, the doctrine of adoption is based upon the real, eternal relationship between the Father and the Son. It's not a generic idea of adoption. No, the Father and the Son have always existed as Father and Son. That is the real, eternal relationship, and the Son certifies you, authorizes you to receive His own Sonship. You don't become God, but you get to have that same relationship where you know the Father. That's one of the things that's so new about the new covenant.

If you drop down to verse 18,

the only begotten son who comes from the father's side, he's made him known.

That nearness, that love, that intimacy, the one who gets to eat at his father's table by nature invites you, who by nature should not be there, to know where your seat is. To know you belong. You're not there by nature. Jesus, by nature, is the Son of God. We are adopted into that family. I think we even have it better than Adam, we could say. We at least can't lose that sonship like Adam, if he had sonship. I don't believe Adam was the same kind of son. He was created, he was the offspring by creation, but this is a new kind of family where we get to come into the presence of God and pray to Him as Father.

The Father adopts us, the Son shares His relationship with the Father with us, and the Holy Spirit seals us and assures us. There's a way in which the power of this message of adoption, the right to be children of God, should give you great assurance of who you are and should shape who you think you are.

Third, We are adopted to know the Father and enjoy Him. We're adopted to have a renewed relationship that's more intimate, that's more near than what even Adam experienced before the fall. Grow in confidence and love that the Father has for you. You love God because He first loved you. You know His great love because He sent His Son to die for you. You know Jesus' love because He laid down His life for you. You know the Spirit's love because He testifies in your own heart that you are a child of God. Draw near to know the Father, to enjoy Him in His generosity, in His grace, in His love. Fourth, you've been adopted to be like the Son. He's come not just to give you a new relationship, but a new measure. You are to be conformed to the son. Over and over again, actually, if we look at that predestined language, you're predestined to be conformed to be like the son. He shares his sonship with us, and then he calls us to enjoy all the rights and privileges of being a son, and we're supposed to be transformed so that we act like the son.

We mature up to being renewed image bearers. in the Son. It's important we understand this identity, to have a right understanding of who you are and an evaluation of what your privileges and rights are as a Christian. You're authorized children of God, authorized to go into the presence of God in the name of the Son and call Him Father. The Father loves us, so we can love Him. The Son made us and has come to renew us what we've made a ruin of. The Holy Spirit seals us, we have confidence.

Christian, pray as children of God. Boldly entering into his presence in the name of the Son. Knowing you get to call him Father, something so loving and intimate. Stop being distant from your Heavenly Father. He's come down to you to give you this right. It is a grace to enjoy, a grace that transforms, and a grace that unites us.

Receive him for new life

The second blessing of receiving Christ, verse 13, Jesus receive him for new life. Verse 13, who were born. So notice here, it's who received him, who believe in his name, those he gave the right to become children of God, adoption, and those are who were born, renewed, a new beginning. We can hear here from John 3 that you must be born again. You become a new creation. Oh, the many blessings of what it means to be in Christ. You're adopted in a new relationship. It gives you a new access to God. Here it's another blessing, it's born again. The doctrine of regeneration, to be made anew. It's a new self that you put on, that you walk in.

Let's be very clear, we were dead in sin. We were not alive in sin. That's why we need to be born again. Give a new life, eternal life. We who were walking in destruction on the way to death, we had forsaken his wisdom and truth and righteousness, we rejected him, we did not know him, we did not receive him in our sin. We can be born to new life. A new way to live. Not my old way with Jesus kind of rubber stamped on. No, a whole new way of living that is truly living. Christ came so that you might truly live in Him, instead of that fake thing we do when we sin, which isn't true living. He came to give us true wisdom and righteousness so that we would actually live again, enjoy the life God created us for. He's come to renew that. He has come as the one who is life, who has life, to give life, so we can be born again and enjoy that life.

It means we walk differently. It means we seek to enjoy all those blessings, because what Christ directs us, we see that's what true living is. Another application here, though, is we hold out hope not just that God can change us with this new life, we constantly hold out hope that God can change others with this new life. Some rules here that we've adopted as elders, we always assume the best and hope the best. An absolute principle, believers in Jesus who've been adopted and born again must hold on to. There's always hope. We don't seek to define somebody by their worst moment. We don't seek to define somebody by sinful patterns and practices. Anyone who's in Christ, their identity is they're certified, authorized children of God. We still sin, we still fail, but that isn't our identity. You're a child of God. And we must hold out hope for each other. We don't identify each other with our sin, we identify each other with what Christ has said. We trust him with the power to save us. There's renewal that takes place that transforms us.

It is God's will

Now this last verse, last section here, who were born, and then this last declaration is pretty amazing. Something I always encourage folks, anytime you see a passage that teaches you what the will of God, you really want to pause. Because when God is telling you what his will is, that's a significant moment. Here it's, how are you born again? How are you adopted? It's

not of blood, nor the will of flesh, nor the will of man, but of God.

It's his power, it's his will, it's his purpose. He's telling us the basis of how adoption and being born again take place.

First, it's not by blood. It has nothing to do with the family you're born into. You being born again is the only way you can participate in the blessings of Christ, and that is the will of God that you receive by faith. There is no birthright in Christianity. The only blood your new life is based upon is the blood of Christ that was shed for you. It's not the will of the flesh or the will of man. You can't effort your way to Christ. Parents, you can't effort your children to the grace of Christ. We don't have this kind of power. We don't have this kind of ability, which is why it's all important to recognize what Christmas is all about. It's God coming to execute his will, to change us inside. Praise God, it is of his will to save us. Because we're way too fickle to ever save ourselves or each other. We can never will something this great.

How silly of us to think we can reverse the problems of our own sin, that we could put enough Band-Aids on our problems, that we could change the course of our own hearts and our own problems. God has willed that you become new and that you know him as Father. It is God's will that we receive that new beginning. So what do we see here? Jesus corresponding with the Old Covenant. Abraham was promised children. Children were a great sign of the covenant, but there was one child. The significance here is that one child has been born who is the will of God. He is the one child of Abraham and Judah and David. He's the one child who was born at the right time to make a new kind of people. The children of Abraham because they're children of faith. It's because God has willed this, promised this, fulfilled those promises, that we can know Him all together as Father. We can help carry each other up to the Father in prayer. We help each other grow up to the maturity of Christ as we speak His truth and love. This is the great hope we have. This is the great identity that's supposed to shape us. We receive him by faith and become his children and are renewed.

Will you pray with me?

Father, we thank you that you did not leave us in our folly, our rebellion, and our inability to hear you or know you. Thank you that you've come down, that the Father, you've sent your Son down to be with us, so his light shines for everyone, so that everyone might see who you are, they might see who he is and believe. We pray that no one will leave this room without believing in Jesus today. I believe those who are united with Christ and are adopted, that they would be encouraged, know how to encourage each other in that new relationship. That we would eagerly be transformed to be more like your son. We thank you that we can receive Christ. We thank you that it is your will to invite us into your table and enjoy you and your love. In Jesus name we pray, amen.