From Foreigners To Family Series

FROM FOREIGNERS TO FAMILY

Text: Eph. 2:19-22

Introduction

1. Illustration: Leslie Lynch King, Jr. was born on Monday, July 14, 1913 in Omaha, Nebraska. His parents separated sixteen days after his birth and were divorced the following December. His father was abusive and had a drinking problem. His mother took her baby and moved back to her parents’ home in Grand Rapids, Michigan where she later married a man named Gerald Ford, a paint salesman. Ford later adopted young Leslie and gave him his own name. Later in his life, Leslie Lynch King became Gerald Ford, the 38th president of the United States. Born Leslie Lynch King, by adoption, Gerald Ford entered a new family and was given a new name. He became part of a royal line of men...….all because he was adopted into a new family with a new father. When we were saved by faith in Jesus Christ, God the Father adopted us and placed us into His family. We were given a new name, written down in the Lamb's Book of Life in Heaven. We were placed into the royal line of believers from the beginning who follow Jesus Christ, the Lion of the Tribe of Judah. We have a new father, a new family, a new name, a new destiny and a new life!

2. Once we were foreigners, strangers, outsiders and, worst of all, sinners.

3. But God sent Jesus, his own son, to die on the cross for us. As a result, we became his children and he adopted us into his family.

4. Because of what Christ has done we have become…

a. God’s Family

b. God’s Temple

5. Read Eph. 2:19-22

Proposition: We have a responsibility to live not only as God’s family, but also as people with God’s very presence living inside of them.

Transition: Because of what Christ has done we have become…

1. God’s Family (19).

A. No Longer Strangers

1. One of the great terms in Christian teaching is the concept of transformation. It brings to mind the illustration of the caterpillar, who transforms from the ugly worm to a beautiful butterfly.

2. That is what Paul is talking about here; what we once were is compared to what we have become. In v. 19, Paul writes, “So now you Gentiles are no longer strangers and foreigners. You are citizens along with all of God’s holy people. You are members of God’s family.”

a. You’ll notice the two terms that Paul uses here, strangers and foreigners. Both of these words describe people who live in another country not their own who have no rights compared to natural born citizens.

b. If you recall, last time we talked about the fact that these Gentiles were considered outsiders and people without hope by the Jews.

c. But here Paul tells them that they are no longer strangers and foreigners. They are in fact citizens with all of God’s people, once outsiders but now insiders.

d. More importantly, they are now members of the family.

e. They were now full members of the family, not servants, but sons and daughters with all the rights and privileges of natural born children.

f. One of the first things I say to someone who has just accepted Christ into their lives is, “welcome to the family!”

g. Before we came to Christ, we weren’t even citizens, we were foreigners and strangers, but now we’re not just citizens were family, God’s family.

B. Abba Father

1. There are seasons when doubts and fears abound, and so suffocate us with their fumes that we cannot even raise a cry. Then the indwelling Spirit represents us, speaks for us, and makes intercession for us, crying in our name, and making intercession for us according to the will of God. The cry "Abba, Father" rises up in our hearts even when we feel as if we could not pray and dare not think ourselves children. Then we may each say, "I live, yet not I, but the Spirit that dwells within me." On the other hand, at times our soul gives such a sweet assent to the Spirit’s cry that it becomes ours also. Then, at that time, we more than ever own the work of the Spirit, and still call out to him the blessed cry, "Abba, Father." Notice a very sweet fact about this cry: it is literally the cry of the Son. God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, and that Spirit cries in us exactly according to the cry of the Son.

2. We are no longer strangers and foreigners, but we are the children of Abba Father.

a. So, you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God’s Spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him, “Abba, Father.” 16 For his Spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God’s children.” (Rom. 8:15-16).