Welcome to God’s Family!
a sermon based on Romans 8:12-17
by Rev. Randy Quinn

People often talk about their church as a family.  I know I personally have often referred to this group of people as 'my church family'.

That was even more true when I was single and in the Navy.  My biological family lived too far away to see regularly, especially since I moved so often, so the church became my family away from home.

Perhaps you have thought of this as your family, too.  You come here to find love and support.  You greet one another as if you were brothers and sisters.  And when there is a need, we are all ready to pitch in and help.

But I suspect that most of us aren't completely comfortable with that idea.  We say we're family, but there is a limit to how familiar we want to become.

You know what I mean.  Those little things that we know about ourselves that we don't want anyone else to know – things that our parents may know, our brothers and sisters may know, even some of our in-laws may know, but we wouldn't want anyone in the church to know.

Ø      Some of us drink milk from the carton.

Ø      Others eat ice cream out of the container.

Ø      There are some of us who snore.

Ø      In some families there are nicknames that only family members use – and often only family members know.

Ø      Some are spend-thrifts, while others are so tight with their money that people can hear Lincoln cry for help whenever a penny is loose in their pockets.

I could add other things to the list, but I don't need to.  You know what I'm talking about, those family secrets that we all know and have.  Not that any of those things are wrong.  Not that keeping the secrets is sinister.  It's just that we don't normally publish that kind of information.

But it's also true that we don't include our 'church family' in those secrets either.  Our concept of the church as family does have its limitations.

When we actually become part of another family, we begin to learn those secrets.  When Ronda and I were married, we began to learn things about each other that we had kept hidden while we were dating.  Each of our families had known some of those things, but when we became a new family, we learned those things about each other.

When Ronda goes to Colfax to work, she often stays with a good friend of hers in Saint John.  She is there so often they have begun to treat her as family, too.  One day we found the perfect thank you card for Janet.

On the cover, the card said "Thank you for your Hospitality.  You made me feel so much at home . . ." and on the inside it said, "that I almost kept the bathroom door open."

Since that doesn't happen in the church, it would appear that the church as a family is more of a metaphor than a reality.  But in our text for today, Paul suggests that it is more than metaphor.  It is reality.

Paul speaks about that in two ways.  First, he speaks about our adoption into the family of God, and second, he invites us to use the family name of God in our prayers.

In Paul's day, adoption was only used when there were no natural-born children.  It was a means of passing on estates to the next generation when there wouldn't otherwise be a next generation.  Often it would be a much-loved slave who would be adopted; but if there were heirs already, no one would be adopted.

Because of the levirate marriage in the Law of Moses, there was no need for adoption in the Old Testament[1].  There was no such thing.  The closest we have to the concept is when Ruth chooses to become Naomi's daughter, a place where there is nothing to inherit and a situation in which the child is adopting a parent rather than a parent adopting the child.

Paul is suggesting a radically different type of adoption in this case.  God decides to adopt children despite having a natural-born heir; and not just one heir, but many heirs who will share in the riches of the Kingdom.

God has made it possible for us to become a part of and welcomes us into God's own family.

And as members of that family, Paul shares with us one of the family secrets, the nickname of God.  Abba.  The name only appears in one other place in the entire Bible – when Jesus prays in the Garden of Gethsemane (Mk 14:36).  It is a name that implies a close relationship with God – almost like "daddy" would be in English.

And as members of this family, Paul says we have permission to call God by that name.  Abba.  Father.  Daddy.  Names that imply a close and intimate relationship.

As frightening as it may seem, God, who knows all of our secrets, has invited us to speak – in other words, to pray – on an intimate level.  The God that many of us think is 'out there' somewhere, is ‘right here’ in our midst.  Right here in our hearts.  As close to us as a sigh.

And God desires to be in close relationship with us.

As many of you know, Ronda and I have been licensed foster parents.  Over the years, I suppose we have had over a hundred different children living in our home for varying amounts of time.  Some were with us for months at a time.  Others were with us for a matter of a few hours.

But almost always, one of the first questions that needed to be addressed was what to call us.  Some preferred to call us "Randy and Ronda".  Others preferred "Mr and Mrs Quinn."  Still others chose to call us "Mom and Dad."

Whenever the child preferred "Mom and Dad", we always made it a point to tell them that we weren't their real Mom and Dad.  But if it's easier to remember, we'd answer to that name.

And whenever I think about that discussion with foster children, I remember when Ronda and I were first married.  Her two children, Jason and Tonya, never called me "Dad."  For them, it was, and still is, "Mom and Randy."

But I also remember the first time I heard Tonya introduce me as her Dad to a friend of hers.  When she said that, I knew I was finally a part of her family.  Though she never uses that name when she speaks to me, I know she uses it when she speaks about me.  (And one of my most prized possessions is a Father’s Day card she sent me in which she tells me I have been more like a dad to her than her own father was.)

Paul says we are a part of God's family.  And I wonder, what do you call God?  What name do you use?  If you were called by God on the phone, how would you answer?

Would you say, "Hello, God"?

or "Hello, Father"?

or "Hello, Jesus"?

or "Hello, Yahweh"?

or "Hello, Friend"?

or "Hello, Jehovah"?

or "Hello, Spirit"?

or "Hello, Abba"?

What is the name you use when you address God?

When you talk about God to your friends or in your home, do you speak about God as your creator?  or your savior?  or your boss?

Paul invites us to use the name Jesus used in his prayers, Abba.  He bases that on our mutual adoption, the new relationship we have with God because of what Jesus has done and is doing for us.

As members of God’s family, Paul says we can address God in the most intimate of terms.

Paul is also clear that Jesus uses the name Abba in the most difficult time of his life, in the Garden of Gethsemane.  "Abba, Father, everything is possible for you.  Take this cup from me.  Yet not what I will, but what you will.” (Mk 14:36).

Paul knows that to address God in the intimate language that Jesus used is to accept God as the source of all life and the one who directs our lives.

And maybe that's why we're so afraid to refer to God as family.  Maybe that's why we hesitate to push the church to become more like family than it is.  Maybe it's because we want to remain in control.

When foster children referred to me as "Dad," I knew they were also giving me permission to make choices for them.  When they preferred to call me "Mr Quinn," I knew they were submitting to authority based on the role I played, not the relationship we had.

When we call God, "Abba, Father," we are claiming an intimate relationship with God that gives God permission to tell us what to do.  And by implication, we are saying that we will do what God desires.  "Not my will, but yours."

That is the relationship that God is after, a close and intimate relationship in which we are in regular conversation – in which we pray regularly.  And the rewards of that relationship include all that Jesus has received, including sonship and resurrection – as well as the risks involved.

God has chosen to adopt us.  We can each 'veto' God's choice or we can come close and become God's children.  We can join the “Family of God”.

I hope you will join me and draw closer to God.  I pray that you will choose the level of intimacy that God has invited us into.  And who knows, maybe our individual decisions will affect our church so that we will become more like family than we have ever been before.  And then we will all become insiders in the family of God.

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[1]  The Levirate Marriage required the oldest brother of a deceased man to have a child by the deceased man’s wife.  The child of their union would be legally considered the child of the deceased man and inherit the deceased man’s estate.  See Deuteronomy 25:5-10 for details.