SONSHIP

Galatians 1: 15-16; Galatians 4: 4-5, 26-27; 7; Ephesians 1: 3-7

It will not be very difficult, beloved friends, in the light of the scriptures we have read, to understand what is in our hearts at this time. We desire to bring before you in connection with the scriptures read (though not confining ourselves to them) the subject of sonship. I feel the greatness and importance of the subject, and how little I am qualified to open it out, and, at the same time, one feels the limitations of our present time.

What I desire, in the first place, is to attempt to show you from the scriptures, especially the New Testament scriptures, what I might term the origin of sonship, and in connection with the apprehension of this I think we shall be brought to see something of the character of it, something of the significance and meaning of sonship.

In the first place, I think the real origin of sonship is the relationships and affections existing between divine Persons in the Godhead. I speak particularly with regard to the Father and the Son; I think every one of us must feel that if we are going to understand anything of scripture, anything of the truth of Christianity, we must begin with God, and we must begin with the revelation that God has been pleased to make of Himself in the Person of the Son of God, our Lord Jesus Christ; and I am increasingly persuaded, as to myself, that it is most important that we should start there. Now I may say things that are very simple, but I believe they are important, and need to be clearly apprehended in our souls; and I would make this remark—that when you come to the revelation of God in the Person of our Lord Jesus Christ, what you come to see is this—that in the revelation of God there has come to light the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and the way in which God has revealed Himself is in connection with the relationships and affections that have existed from all eternity between divine Persons. I trust I speak soberly and carefully, and that I shall not say anything that would lead anybody to think that in respect of these things there is any ground given for mere intellectual speculation we are shut up, beloved friends, to the revelation of God as given us in the Person of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Now, with regard to the Spirit, there is a simple statement in Mr Darby’s translation, in the Gospel of John (chapter 15: 26), about the Spirit. We are told that the Spirit goes forth (now mark!) from with the Father. Thus you see the blessed Spirit in all His wonderful ministry, whether it is on the side of the revelation of God, or whether it is on our side—our apprehension and appreciation, or, you may say, our entrance into the revelation of God, you see how the Spirit of God Himself stands inseparably connected with the relationship subsisting between the Father and the Son. Well, you can only speak of the Father and the Son according to what has been revealed, and what is really written in the scriptures. To pretend to know one jot or one tittle outside what is recorded in the scriptures would be a vain pretension and would simply indicate that one has some confidence in one’s own mind apart from that which is written. We have the wonderful revelation in chapter 1: 18 of John’s gospel—“No one hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him”. In that wonderful verse comes to light something of the truth of the relationship between the Father and the only-begotten Son, who subsists and has ever subsisted in the Father’s bosom, and, may I say, the use of the word “bosom” not only points out the relationship, but points out the affections existing between the Father and the Son in such relationship, for the bosom, beloved friends, is used in scripture as a figure of speech to indicate the home of affection, and in this case it conveys the thought of the home of divine and holy reciprocal affections subsisting between the Father and the Son—all the Father’s love to the Son and the Son’s love to the Father. I am going carefully, and a little slowly, but I want you to get hold of this wonderful subject. What we find is this—we have been speaking of the revelation of God in the Person of the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, but in speaking of this the fact of incarnation is, of course, involved; and incarnation, as simply as it can be stated in the light of scripture, is the fact of a divine Person, an eternally-existing Person, who is described as the only-begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, that divine Person has taken upon Him the form of man, the condition of man. To put it in the exact language of scripture, chapter 1: 14 of John’s gospel states, “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us (and we have contemplated his glory, a glory as of an only-begotten with a father), full of grace and truth”. Whenever He is viewed in scripture as having taken upon Him the condition of man, His personal and distinctive title is the “Son of God”. The title Son of God does not describe Him as a divine Person in eternal relationship with the Father; it describes that same divine Person as a Man down here, as a Man born in time, for when He was brought into this world the Father salutes Him, “Thou art my Son: this day have I begotten thee”. Every thought of begetting, or of having been begotten, must be put out of your mind when you conceive of Him as a divine Person in eternal relationship with the Father; the reasoning of theology is fatally false and misleading; theologians have said that He was eternally begotten before all ages by the Father; it is nothing but confusion; it is as a Man, beloved friends, that we have the account of His generation in time. Then it was that God said to Him: “Thou art my Son: this day have I begotten thee”; and we know from the opening of the Gospel of Luke, when the angel Gabriel had that wonderful interview with the Virgin Mary, how he said to her in response to her beautiful expression of wonderment as to how this could be: “The Holy Spirit shall come upon thee, and power of the Highest overshadow thee, wherefore the holy thing also which shall be born shall be called Son of God”, Luke 1: 35.

Now to speak in a very simple way—a very direct way: in that blessed Person—the Son of God who was begotten by the power of God—by the power of the Holy Ghost in the womb of the virgin, we have, as to His actual being here in time, the beginning of sonship. Wonderful men had been here, men owned and used of God; it has always been a marvel to me to read of certain men in the Old Testament scriptures: I am not losing sight of the peculiar character of Christianity, and of what we are brought into in Christianity, but take, for instance, a man like Daniel as the Holy Ghost presents him to us, one feels how small one is in the presence of such a man; but, beloved friends, never had there been such a Man in this world before as that One born of the virgin—begotten in the womb of the virgin by the overshadowing power of the Highest—of the Holy Ghost. There never will be such another as He. We have read, “for ye are all God’s sons by faith in Christ Jesus”; but that Man is not a son of God, He is not one of the sons, He is the Son of God. He, as born into this world, was “the Son of God”; God stood in a relationship to Him as Man that He never stood in to any other, and never will. He is the Son of God; and I am sure the Spirit of God would lead us to give Him His proper pre-eminence; He would produce even in our minds, as well as in our hearts, thoughts and feelings in relation to Himself as He would to none other. Now it is in Him you have the beginning, the setting forth of what sonship is, and I think the gospels help you. I am not taking account of the distinctions between Matthew and Mark and Luke and John; there are distinctions, important distinctions, but you may read the four gospels just as they stand, and if you keep your eye upon that blessed Person you may learn the truth of sonship in Him as in no other. There was in Him—in that Man; not only the revelation—the perfect expression of all that God is as Father, as Son, and as Spirit in all those wonderful divine relationships and affections, but there was more than that, there was in that Person, that same blessed Man, the perfect setting forth of sonship—that is, of what man is in relation to God; man in the knowledge of God; man walking in all the light of what God is; perfectly answering to it, the Object of the Father’s affection, and the One too in whom responsive affection is fully set forth. I am not drawing your attention to anything new; it has often been said that whenever the Lord addresses God, whether in Matthew, Mark, Luke or John, it is never under the name of God; the only instance of that is on the cross where He was making atonement—where it was a question of meeting the claims and maintaining the rights of God as such, sin being in question, but apart from that it is always “Father”. God, as God, may speak of responsibility—of judgment, but not the Father. That word is a word of holy and divine affection, a word of grace, beyond all human thought. He always said Father; He ever walked in the sense of that relationship with God. In Hebrews 1 we have: “I will be to him for Father, and he shall be to me for Son”. Was not that made good? How He walked in all the light, and peace, and joy of it! There was in His blessed heart, as Man, an unvarying response to all the Father’s love, and to all the peace, all the joy of it. Peace and joy form the atmosphere in which that blessed name of Father is known, and in all the unclouded light of the Father’s love, and all the peace and joy that belongs to it, He walked as man down here.

I have quoted it, but I will quote just once more, John 1: 14. It says: “And we have contemplated his glory, a glory as of an only-begotten with a father, full of grace and truth”. As it has often been said, He found nothing in manhood. Though truly a man, manhood never contributed to Him. He brought everything into manhood, as a divine Person taking His place in manhood, the distinguishing glory of His manhood derived from what belonged to Him as a divine Person in the Godhead in relationship with the Father.

Now that is sonship. Sonship is an integral part of Christianity. Sonship is not presented as a privilege dependent upon spiritual attainment on the part of Christians; it belongs to the wonderful revelation of God in the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God—it is set forth in Him. It is as wide as redemption is, see Gal 1: 16. “To reveal his Son in me, that I may announce him as glad tidings among the nations”. All that is set forth in Him (as another has said) is for every man—righteousness, life, sonship. God has no other thought for man, save what is set forth in that Man. Hence the Son of God is preached, and what is set forth in Him is God’s mind for every man. But I go further. In speaking of those who believe, I can say, “Ye are all God’s sons by faith in Christ Jesus”. There is no other position now for Christians—it belongs to Christianity; the place of sons is given to us and no other.

I think all would readily admit that the highest unfolding of the truth of Christianity is found in the Epistle to the Ephesians. Did you ever take account of that expression in connection with the prayer of the apostle, beginning with chapter 1: 15? He prays for three things—the first is, that we might know what is the hope of the calling of God (he addresses “God and Father”, not ‘Father and God’. In Ephesians we are not in John, we are in Paul, and so it is the “God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ”); then the second thing he prays for is that we might know what is the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints; but look at the third—that we may know what is the surpassing greatness of His power towards its. Is that to a few Christians?—a few that might be taken account of as “young men” or “fathers”, 1 John 2? No, it is “towards us who believe”, chap 1: 19. Is not that lovely? I want to cheer you tonight, and I pray that the Spirit of God may give the answer in your soul to what is really true of you—that you are one of the sons of God. There is nothing else—nothing lower for you. Would I make light of the Spirit’s work in us—would I make light of spiritual attainment? God forbid. I take great account of the distinctions in 1 John 2, between the children, the young men, and the fathers; the fathers are characterised as those who have known Him from the beginning. That is the result of the Spirit’s work, but, beloved, you are one of God’s sons. Do not look within to learn what sonship is; look at the Son of God—look at that Man, and then take account of yourself as one of God’s sons. “We are all the sons of God by” what?—by experience, by attainment? Oh no, it is “by faith in Christ Jesus”. Have you faith in Him? Well, He is the Son of God, and He is the measure of everything in Christianity. If we speak about the Spirit’s work, let me say the work of the Spirit of God in you and in me does not proceed on the ground of speculation, or of questioning or of doubting. Do you say, ‘I would like to know what it is to be in the good of sonship’? Are you sure that you would like that? Well, let me tell you then that there is One who desires it for you more than you do, He wants you to be in the good of it. But the Spirit of God is not going to work in your soul or in mine on the ground of unbelief, He works on the ground of faith—on the ground of our believing. Now let me ask, is it clear to you tonight that you are one of the sons of God? If sonship belongs to you, all the blessedness of it, whatever is connected with it, whatever attaches to it, belongs to you. What was the gospel Paul preached in Acts 9: 20? “And straightway ... he preached Jesus that he is the Son of God”. That was the first note of it, and Paul never preached below that; he might emphasise this official title, or that, with regard to this wonderful work, but the first note of it was that Jesus is the Son of God.

Then, as we read just now, in Galatians 1, he speaks of his own experience, how it pleased God to separate him from his mother’s womb, and called him by His grace, to reveal His Son in him. God did that, God revealed His Son, that is not the Father revealing His only-begotten Son, who is in the Father’s bosom; but God, as God, revealed His Son—God’s Son, in the apostle; and what for?—“That I may announce him as glad tidings among the nations”. That was the gospel that had been announced in Galatia; the glad tidings announced to them were the glad tidings that Jesus is the Son of God. A Man? Yes; but oh, another kind of Man: a Man, beloved, that lived in the sense, not only of relationship—so that, as Man here, He could speak of God always as His Father—but He ever lived in the sense of the Father’s love, and there was in Him a full response to that love.

Well now, we are all God’s sons by faith in Christ Jesus; and what does that involve? Why, that you are in such a relationship with God, that you so know God, that your whole being is lit up with the light of God, and that in your heart there is response to that love. The “sons” speak a language of their own; they speak one language, a language common to the sons—“Abba, Father”. Do you speak it? “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God”; we are apt to take that out of its context, and connect it with our responsible life in flesh, but it goes right on, “For ye have not received a spirit of bondage again for fear, but ye have received a spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father”, Rom 8: 14. “Abba, Father” is the response from a heart that knows God as Father, and knows all that wonderful love that fills the Father’s heart and is responsive to it. That is sonship. Hence, you see, the difference between Galatians and Ephesians; it is not that there is one truth of sonship in Galatians and another truth of it in Ephesians—it is the same truth of sonship in Galatians as in Ephesians; the difference is not in the truth, but in the way the Spirit of God applies the truth. The Galatians had had a good start; the right kind of gospel had been preached to them, the best preached gospel that ever was preached—that Jesus is the Son of God, and they had got the Spirit; they had had a fine start; but something had happened since; those Judaising teachers had got in among them, and they were thereby hindered spiritually, they were taken up with that which is of the world—with “beggarly elements”, and what else? With the flesh. These go together; and in turning aside from the gospel, and from what properly belongs to sonship, they had turned aside to the “beggarly elements” of the world, and to a religious revival of the flesh; and now the Spirit of God through the apostle uses the truth of sonship to recover them, and to deliver them completely from all that under the power of which they had fallen ... and how wonderfully he uses the truth to recover them. The leaven of Galatian-ism, which was introduced in Galatia, has been among the saints of God from that day to this. So the Spirit of God brings in the truth of sonship to recover them, and He tells them, “Ye are all sons of God by faith in Christ Jesus”. And that is not all; He tells them that they were not only the sons of God by faith in Christ Jesus, but because they are sons God had sent forth the Spirit of His Son into their hearts. Do you know what really recovers people in this present day? Do you know what delivers the saints from everything that is of the character of Galatian-ism? It is their waking up to the truth not only of what they are, but of what they have got. He says, “Ye are all sons of God”; and when did they come into that? When they believed on the Son of God; when they believed the gospel that came to them; and then because they were sons, God sent forth the Spirit of His Son into their hearts, crying, Abba, Father. No wonder the apostle felt so keenly about them! How the enemy had come in through these Judaisers!—had really bewitched them and hindered them, when they might have been going on in all the joy and in all the freedom, in all the heavenly freedom of sonship!

Well, we may say a little more about the Lord Jesus Christ as a Man here, as the Son of God: what do you find? Why, you find He is the heavenly Man; He is the second Man out of heaven; and so His connections were not with anything here; His connections were in heaven even while He was here; and so, beloved, as sons of God we are not connected with Jerusalem here, Jerusalem above, which is free, is our mother. What would have been the use of those men coming from Jerusalem to Galatia and talking to the saints there about circumcision or keeping the law if they had been in the light and the good of sonship? What is the use of telling me that I ought to join this or that down here if I am in the light of sonship? I do not want to join anything.

What a wonderful thing it is to be in the faith of the gospel that Jesus is the Son of God! We receive adoption or sonship on the ground of redemption, but we receive it as gift from God, a gift which is nothing short of sonship! If you were not a son, you would not be in accord with the Lord Jesus Christ—the Son of God: you would not be in agreement with Him, there would be disparity on your part; but there is none; He is the heavenly One, and He will always be the heavenly One; and we are heavenly ones. Is He the Son of God? We are all sons of God with Him. Did He as a Man live in the unclouded, unsullied consciousness of God’s love as Father? He did, and that is your privilege and mine.

I am not opening it out fully; I have not the time to take up its connections, for there are certain connections which come to light in Galatians; you find amongst them new creation. We have to be the subjects of new creation to come into these things. Of course, the Lord Jesus Christ (I would say it reverently) did not need new creation. That “holy thing also which shall be born shall be called Son of God”, but we come in on the ground of redemption, and in us sonship involves new creation, and that is the only thing that counts; circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing.

Now there is the same blessed truth of sonship in Ephesians, but it does not regard any present or actual spiritual condition on the part of the saints. Sonship in Ephesians is presented in the full light of all the purpose of God, and not only presented in the full light, but presented in connection with the full scope of those purposes of God ... that is why I read those verses: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ: according as he has chosen us in him before the world’s foundation, that we should be holy and blameless before him in love: having marked us out beforehand for adoption through Jesus Christ to himself”, Eph 1: 3-5. Sonship there comes out in the most marvellous way—in the largest way marked us out beforehand for sonship; it goes back before your history, back before the entire history of man in responsibility. I have no doubt that it is in the light of this that you have it in Proverbs 8, although, of course, there it is anticipative, but there it is.

Now all this blessed light is brought to bear upon us, and I would that we might take account of sonship in this connection, because it sets the soul in such a large place, it sets you in the holy freedom of sonship, not simply, as in Galatians, to deliver you from Judaism, or the beggarly elements of the world, or the flesh in a religious way, but it is brought to bear on your soul to set you before God in all the greatness, the magnificence and largeness of the purposes of God. It looks on in Ephesians to the age to come, it looks on to that wonderful day of display; but it is the light of it now, the largeness of it now, filling our souls ... Do not take it up doctrinally, God would have you to be in the good of it, in the good of what we are, and God would set us in the present light, and love, and heavenly liberty of it all, and in that way the Lord would maintain us here, and we should prove, not simply what comes to light in Galatians, as setting us free, as delivering us from everything and anything the enemy would bring in (the man in the flesh, or any connection with the beggarly elements of this world), but the Lord would make it good in us in connection with that which is heavenly, with all that is divine, and with all that is eternal. It is an anticipation, of course, of what we shall be in the actuality of—but the blessed thing is, God has brought it before us in all this wonderful way that we might be in the reality of sonship even now.

I trust the Lord may interest our hearts in it vitally—not merely our minds. May He engage our hearts in all the present light of it for His Name’s sake!