Rewriting birth certificates

I must admit that I was planning on writing either about Pascal's Wager or the Big Bang theory today, but decided against it because I have a treasure on my heart that I can't wait to share with my readers. So, I guess I'll have to pretend to be an intellectual in another post (hint hint...read next week's posts). As most of you know, Rhiannon and I have been married for more than 5 years now (October 6th was our 5-year mark) and have experienced multiple early miscarriages. This is one of the reasons why the film Facing the Giants struck such a deep chord in us. We could really empathize with the characters. Although we continue to believe that we will have biological children, we have come to grips with the fact that the children we raise may not be our birth children.

It's interesting how God uses life experiences to teach us more about His wonderful plan for us. As an evangelist, I am always looking for more ways to appreciate and communicate the gospel. Had we never had problems conceiving, I may have missed out on one of the most profound truths relating to how God views those who are in Christ, and that is the metaphor of adoption. I had this thought as I was taking my daily power walk the other day (at least that is one good thing I get from these walks-a time to think. It sure hasn't helped with my waistline yet). I thought to myself about how when I adopt a child, the child will then belong to me. I began to think to myself "What would it take for me to disinherit my own child whom I have chosen to belong to me?" If little Johnny or Joe comes into my house and starts misbehaving, will I as a parent say "Well Johnny, you can say buh bye now (notice the Saturday Night Live spelling). We no longer want you in our family." I think I would be a rather awful parent if that were the case.

I then began to think to myself "How does God think about me? If I am adopted into His family, what would it take for Him to disinherit me?" Without getting into a discussion about whether it is possible or not for God's children to be disinherited (aka...lose their salvation), I can imagine that if it would take an awful lot for me as a human parent to drive me to that point, what would I saying about God if I believed that He disinherits His children easier than I would disinherit my own children? It's a good question to think about. Keep in mind this does not say that my future children might not choose to disinherit me someday; only that it would be difficult for me as a parent to disinherit my own children-especially ones that I have adopted.

Perhaps the most powerful analogy that I might not have ever known is this. In the State of Missouri, when a child in the foster care system is adopted, the government issues them a new birth certificate with the names of the adoptive parents on it. I don't know about you, but that speaks volumes to me. When I place my faith in Christ, God writes me a new birth certificate and puts His name on it as the Father! This means that when I experience the "new birth" that Jesus talked about, not only am I changed on the inside, but I now have a new standing with God. Theologically speaking, based on Romans chapter 5, you could say that all of us had Adam as our spiritual father before we were born again. But when Christ died on the cross for us, God gave us a new birth certificate! When you and I receive our new birth certificate by faith (not of works) we become adopted into His family. I can only imagine what it would be like if I were an abused and neglected child, written off by society, and then, all of the sudden a king offers to adopt me and write his name on my birth certificate. This is, in fact, God's offer of salvation for anybody and everybody. Knowing this, I can't imagine why anyone would want to refuse the offer! It almost sounds too good to be true, but it isn't! For the love of God, I want to shout to the world-take the deal!