When God is Your Father | Lee Cummings

When God is Your Father

…Your Identity is defined and your value is affirmed

One of the greatest longings of the human heart and most critical issue in our day is for someone to tell us who we are and that we have worth.

One of the central aspects of becoming a Christian – is that God not only “defines” for us “who we are – in Christ” but also “affirms” our value – not based upon our merit, but upon His mercy.

When God is Your Father….Your Identity is Defined

1. We become children of God when we believe and receive Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior.

John 1:12-13

But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. 

1. We experience a second birth into the Kingdom and God’s family

John 3:5-7

5 Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. 7 Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again

1 Peter 1: 3

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead..

1. Water Baptism is a public funeral for our sinful identity and also birth announcement our new identity in Christ.

Romans 6:3-11

3 Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. 

5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6 We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. 7 For one who has died has been set free from sin. 8 Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9 We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. 10 For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. 11 So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. 

1. In Christ… We are no longer free agents, we are redeemed.

1 Corinthians 6:19-20

Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, 20 for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body

When God is Your Father…Your Value is Affirmed   

Ephesians 1:3-8

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, 4 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love 5 he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, 6 to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. 7 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, 8 which he lavished upon us

1. You are chosen, not tolerated.

2. You are now holy and blameless in His sight.

3. You have been adopted into His family.

4. You are accepted and no longer rejected.

5. You are redeemed and no longer a slave.

6. The price was Jesus’s blood. = God’s Son.

7. God has lavished His love on you, because He poured out His wrath on Him.