Adoption

No longer slaves, but children

Paul describes God's making us his children with the word huiothesia (υἱοθεσία), ‘placing as a son’; in the New Testament only Paul uses it. In the Roman world an adopted son took the family's name and full rights of inheritance, and Paul uses that picture to tell the gospel. God sent his Son to redeem those under the law, "that we might receive our adoption as sons" (Galatians 4:5). It springs from God's eternal love: "He predestined us for adoption as His sons through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of His will" (Ephesians 1:5). The language of sonship does not leave daughters out: "I will be a Father to you, and you will be My sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty" (2 Corinthians 6:18).

Christ is God's Son by nature; we become children by grace, in him. When the risen Jesus spoke of ascending "to My Father and your Father" (John 20:17), Augustine noted the difference: "Mine by nature, yours by grace" Augustine. Those adopted receive freedom to call on God without fear:

For you did not receive a spirit of slavery that returns you to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption to sonship, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. And if we are children, then we are heirs: heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ

Romans 8:15-17

Yet adoption is not yet complete. We "groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies" (Romans 8:23).

How the church came to say it

The Westminster Shorter Catechism names adoption among the benefits the effectually called receive in this life, with justification and sanctification Shorter Catechism, Q. 32, and defines it:

Adoption is an act of God's free grace, whereby we are received into the number, and have a right to all the privileges, of the sons of God.

Westminster Shorter Catechism, Q. 34

The Westminster Confession gives adoption a chapter of its own and lists the children's privileges: they "have access to the throne of grace with boldness", and are pitied, protected, provided for and chastened as by a father, yet never cast off Westminster Confession 12. If justification is the courtroom, adoption is the family. God does not only acquit sinners; he brings them home. "Behold what manner of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God" (1 John 3:1). Adoption is close to regeneration: the new birth gives the life of a child, adoption the standing and rights of one, and both are given in union with Christ.

Where the traditions differ

All the churches confess that God makes us his children in Christ; the differences are of emphasis. The Catholic and Orthodox churches teach that we become God's children through baptism, and that this sonship is a sharing in God's own life and nature Catechism of the Catholic Church. Reformed theology treats adoption as a benefit distinct from justification, with its own place in the order of salvation.

Wesleyans lay weight on the Spirit's direct witness that we are God's children. John Wesley wrote on Romans 8:16 that the Spirit bears witness with the spirit of every true believer "by a testimony distinct from that of his own spirit, or the testimony of a good conscience" Wesley. Reformed churches also confess the witness of the Spirit of adoption, and describe the assurance it gives as resting together on the truth of God's promises and the inward evidence of grace Westminster Confession 18.2 (see assurance). Either way, adoption is the grace by which believers call God Father with trust instead of fear. See also What does it mean to be saved?