Adopted

It’s funny that most kids want to be older and most adults wouldn’t mind being a few years younger. Kids think about the days they can make the rules. Adults remember fondly the days of less responsibilities and getting to nap. The chance to be trusted, helpful, independent, and contribute always signals a coming of age. We know what it means to have to grow up, not want to grow up, maybe even not be allowed to grow up. 

Growing up spiritually means seeing we’re “adopted”, through Christ, as God’s sons and daughters. Paul writes to a group of young Christians in Galatia. He contrasts an impulsive child with a strong young man who accepts responsibilities of adulthood. We tend to think of being a child of God as helpless or only able to receive. However, the word, adoption in scripture actually means the “placement of an adult son”. In other words, God adopts with the idea that we grow and mature into trusted contributors in God’s work on earth.

In his book, Becoming Who God Intended, David Eckmann highlights “a crucial difference between the ancient world and the modern world…they rarely adopted babies, but instead they adopted adults. When a childless couple was getting so old that any possibility of child-bearing was gone, if well-off, they would legally adopt a young man whom they loved and trusted to take over the family business and handle the family wealth. This was so the couple would be taken care of in their old age.”

Similarly, God has placed us in a family of faith and we are invited to come of age as a trusted heir! Being in community helps us “come of age” where we discover our potential as others help us develop. It’s also a place where we find our contribution.  Community isn’t something we create. It’s what we discover when we do the hard work of finding what we have in common - especially with people unlike ourselves - as we learn to see the image of God in another.