Belonging to the Family

Yes, he was interested in people - in our last phone-call, his first question was, "How's the crushing going?" He loved young people and supported Scripture Union, their camps and school chaplains - both financially and in prayer.

There is joy as well as sadness in such a funeral. We knew that he had belonged to the family of God for most of his life. One family member thought of Paul's words at Antioch in Pisidia: "… when David had served God's purpose in his own generation, he fell asleep…" (Acts 13.36). As we committed him to the Lord, we knew that the Lord had already received him into the life of heaven.

In preparing for a funeral a few years ago the relatives said to me about the deceased, "He was a real Christian man. If he couldn't do a good turn for you, he wouldn't do a bad one. He didn't make it to church very often, but he was a real Christian man. In fact, he never went to church, but he was a real Christian man. He didn't read the Bible much or pray to God, but he was a real Christian man. In fact, he didn't believe in God at all, called himself an atheist, but he was a real Christian man".

Two very different stories of men who had died and were now to face eternity and God on the basis of choices they had made or failed to make. God has the final word - it's not for me to judge. It is much easier if I know a person has been a believer, but if I don't, I leave that final judgment to God.

This is all related to today's theme. There seems to be some confusion about what is involved in "belonging to the family".

Some of us recall the old negro spiritual, "I've got a robe". In one part it says, "everybody talkin' 'bout heaven ain't goin' there…"

We like to dream that God is some kind of "good sport" who'll just let everyone in, no matter what. Yet the wonderful promises of the Bible don't put it that way at all. In fact, the choices we make here in this life will affect our status in eternity. Don't wait till you're old and frail. Now is the time to think and choose about what it means to belong to the family.

Belonging to our human family began before we were born - our parent's love for one another, their desire for a child, their love for us before they ever saw us…

Belonging to God's family begins with the Father's love, his love for us, his longing to include us in his family.

Listen to these words from the Scripture. The Lord said to Jeremiah, "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart" (Jer. 1.5). The Lord's word through Jeremiah, "I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness" (31.3).

David wrote, "I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body" (Ps. 139.14-16).

Sometimes we have the idea that our relationship with God begins with our choice to believe in God. In fact, it begins the other way around.

Earlier this year a child in one of my Religious Education classes said to me, "I don't believe in God". I replied, "But God believes in you!"

That came to him as a bit of a surprise. But it's the only beginning-point - God's love for us and his desire to include us in his family… No matter what we have achieved, no matter how we have failed, no matter how humanly "good" we are or how humanly "bad" our sin, God still believes in us.

What impresses us most in the story of the lost son (Lk. 15.11-32)? Is it that he was so foolish, that he went so far from home, that he became caught up in an immoral life-style…? Is it that he came to his senses and decided to come home and ask to be taken on as a hired hand?

What impresses me most is the love of the Father. He was waiting for his son to return. I think he had already picked out the "fattened calf". He had the robe, ring and sandals ready in advance.

That's a picture of our heavenly Father's love for us. "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life" (Jn 3.16).

"His one and only Son" - that's Jesus. We celebrate his birth at Christmas time and his death on the cross on Good Friday. And there were lots of stories and miracles in between.

In the midst of these stories and miracles, we begin to hear people asking about the true identity of Jesus. We are told that "the crowds were amazed at his teaching, because he taught as one who had authority, and not as their teachers of the law" (Mt. 7.28,29).

It was the question on the mind of the folk in his home town, Nazareth - "Where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers? Isn't this the carpenter's son? Isn't his mother's name Mary, and aren't his brothers James, Joseph, Simon and Judas? Aren't all his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all these things?" (Mt. 13.54-55) They thought they knew all about him and took offense at him.

Jesus didn't go around with a halo on his head. His true identity was hidden from people. Later, away from the prying crowds, he asked his disciples, "Who do people say the Son of Man is?" ("Son of Man" was his preferred way of speaking about himself - it didn't give anything away.) They replied, "Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets". "But" - and this is the key question - "what about you? Who do you say I am?" Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God" (Mt. 16.13-16).

I'm not at all sure Peter understood the full significance of what he had said. It had come as a revelation from the Father, Jesus told him. But when Jesus began to teach them about his coming suffering, death and resurrection, Peter rebuked him. Then Jesus said to Peter, "Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men" (v. 23).

Here was the problem - if Jesus is truly the eternal Son of God, it is quite inconceivable that he should suffer death. Anyway, why should that be?

By the day of Pentecost, Peter was saying, "Men of Israel, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth… was handed over to you by God's set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross…" (Acts 2.22-23).

The cross was part of a human scheme to get rid of him. But it could only work if it was also part of the the Father's plan - the plan to pay the penalty for human sin, so that guilty sinners can be forgiven and be welcomed back into the family.

The Father's love and the Son's coming - both are vitally important for us in belonging to God's family.

So it's all done and that's all there is to it! Well… yes and no! It is all done - that's good news! But the good news calls for a response from each of us. This is where our choices come in. It is possible to receive or refuse, to believe or deny…

The lost son didn't have to come back into the family. In fact, he was so ashamed that he believed he didn't deserve a place in the family at all.

Zacchaeus hid himself from the hostile crowd - and, so he thought, from Jesus - by climbing up a tree (Lk. 19.1-10). His hope was that nobody would see him up there. But the love of the Father and the action of the Son came before the choices and changes that we begin to see in his life.

In family life we often spend time teaching our children to use important little words - I hear some families refer to them as "magic words". There really isn't any "magic" in "please" and "thank you". What they do is take the demanding note out of our requests and make us ready to receive.

To belong to God's family, two little words help us - "sorry" and "thanks". "Sorry" is agreeing with God that we have done the wrong thing, that we have lived without him, that we know we are sinners. "Thanks" says that we know the Father's love and that Jesus came and died for sinners - even for us. It says we know he is welcoming us into his family.

There are other words we use to describe our choices. We make what I like to call a two-fold turn of "repentance" and "faith". "Repentance" is turning from sin - and from our own self-centred autonomous lifestyle. "Faith" is turning to the Father, depending on what Jesus the Son has done for us.

The choices we make here in this life will affect our status in eternity. Don't wait till you're old and frail. Now is the time to think and choose about what it means to belong to the family.

Prayer: Father God, you have loved me with an everlasting love. You sent your Son Jesus who died for my sins and who came alive again. I am sorry for all the ways I have lived my life without reference to you. I repent of my sin. Thank you for your love and that Jesus died for me. I believe in him and receive him into my life. Thank you that you welcome me into your family. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

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