Thomas Watson · 23 of 31

19. They shall be called the children of God · Part 2

Of all others let ministers be impatient when God’s glory is impeached and eclipsed. A minister without zeal is like ’salt that has lost its savour’. Zeal will make men take injuries done to God as done to themselves. It is reported of Chrysostom that he reproved any sin against God as if he himself had received a personal wrong. Let not ministers be either shaken with fear or seduced with flattery. God never made ministers to be as false glasses, to make bad faces look fair. For want of this fire of zeal, they are in danger of another fire, even the ‘burning lake’ (Revelation 21:8), into which the fearful shall be cast.

5 Those who are God’s children and are born of God are of a more noble and celestial spirit than men of the world. They mind ‘things above’ (Colossians 3:2). ‘Whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world’ (1 John 5:4). The children of God live in an higher region. They are compared to eagles (Isaiah 40:31), in regard of their sublimeness and heavenly-mindedness. Their souls are fled aloft. Christ is in their heart (Colossians 1:27) and the world is under their feet (Revelation 12:1). Men of the world are ever tumbling in thick clay. They are ’sons of earth’; not eagles, but earthworms. The saints are of another spirit. They are born of God and walk with God as the child walks with the father. ‘Noah walked with God’ (Genesis 6:9). God’s children show their high pedigree in their heavenly conversation (Philippians 3:20).

6 Another sign of adoption is love to them that are children. God’s children are knit together with the bond of love, as all the members of the body are knit together by several nerves and ligaments. If we are born of God, then we ‘love the brotherhood’ (1 Peter 2:17); He that loves the person, loves the picture. The children of God are his walking pictures, and if we are of God, we love those who have his effigy and portraiture drawn upon their souls. If we are born of God, we love the saints notwithstanding their infirmities. Children love one another though they have some imperfections of nature, a squint-eye, or a crooked back. We love gold in the ore, though it has some drossiness in it. The best saints have their blemishes. We read of the ’spot of God’s children’ (Deuteronomy 32:5). A saint in this life is like a fair face with a scar in it. If we are born of God we love his children though they are poor. We love to see the image and picture of our Father, though hung in never so poor a frame. We love to see a rich Christ in a poor man.

And if we are children of the Highest, we show our love to God’s children:

(i) By prizing their persons above others. He who is born of God ‘honoureth them that fear the Lord’ (Psalm 15:4). The saints are the ‘dearly beloved of God’s soul’ (Jeremiah 12:7). They are his ‘jewels’ (Malachi 3:17). They are of the true blood-royal, and he who is divinely adopted sets an higher estimate upon these than upon others.

(ii) We show our love to the children of God by prizing their company above others. Children love to associate and be together. The communion of saints is precious. Christ’s doves will flock together in company. ‘Like associates with like’. ‘I am a companion of all them that fear thee’ (Psalm 119:63). We read that ‘Abraham bowed himself to the children of Heth’ (Genesis 23:7) A child of God has a love of civility to all, but a love of complacency only to such as are fellow-heirs with him of the same inheritance.

By this persons may try their adoption. It appears plainly that they are not the children of God who hate those that are born of God. They soil and blacken the silver wings of Christ’s doves by their aspersive reproaches. They cannot endure the society of the saints. As vultures hate sweet smells and are killed with them, so the wicked do not love to come near the godly. They cannot abide the precious perfume of their graces. They hate these sweet smells. It is a sign they are of the serpent’s brood who hate the seed of the woman.

7 The seventh sign of God’s children is to delight to be much in God’s presence. Children love to be in the presence of their father. Where the king is, there is the court. Where the presence of God is, there is heaven. God is in a special manner present in his ordinances. They are the ark of his presence. Now if we are children, we love to be much in holy duties. In the use of ordinances we draw near to God. We come into our Father’s presence. In prayer we have secret conference with God. In the Word we hear God speaking from heaven to us, and how does every child of God delight to hear his Father’s voice! In the sacraments God kisses his children with the ‘kisses of his lips’. He gives them a smile of his face and a privy-seal of his love. Oh it is ‘good to draw near to God’ (Psalm 73:28). It is sweet being in his presence. Every true child of God says, ‘a day in thy courts is better than a thousand’ (Psalm 84:10). Slighters of ordinances are none of God’s children, because they care not to be in his presence. They love the tavern better than the temple. ‘Cain went out from the presence of the Lord’ (Genesis 4:16); not that he could go out of God’s sight (Psalm 139:7), but the meaning is, Cain went from the church of God where the Lord gave the visible signs of his presence to his people.

8 The eighth sign is compliance with the will of our heavenly Father. A childlike heart answers to God’s call as the echo answers to the voice. It is like the flower that opens and shuts with the sun. So it opens to God and shuts to temptation. This is the motto of a new-born saint, ‘Speak, Lord, thy servant hears’ (1 Samuel 3:9). When God bids his children pray in their closets, mortify sin, suffer for his name, they are ambitious to obey. They will lay down their lives at their Father’s call. Hypocrites court God and speak him fair, but refuse to go on his errand. They are not children but rebels.

9 The last sign is, He who is a child of God will labour to make others the children of God. The holy seed of grace propagates (Galatians 4:19; Philemon 10). He who is of the seed royal will be ambitiously desirous to bring others into the kindred. Are you divinely adopted? You will studiously endeavour to make your child a child of the most High.

How Christians should bring up their children

There are two reasons why a godly parent will endeavour to bring his child into the heavenly kindred:

(i) Out of conscience. A good parent sees the injury he has done to his child. He has conveyed the plague of sin to him, and in conscience he will endeavour to make some recompense. In the old law, he that had smitten and wounded another was bound to see him healed and pay for his cure. Parents have given their children a wound in their souls and therefore must do what in them lies by admonition, prayers, tears, to see the wound healed.

(ii) Out of flaming zeal to the honour of God. He who has tasted God’s love in adoption looks upon himself as engaged to bring God all the glory he can. If he has a child or acquaintance that are strangers to God he would gladly promote the work of grace in their hearts. It is a glory to Christ when multitudes are born to him.

How far are they from being God’s children who have no care to bring others into the family of God! To blame are those masters who mind more their servants’ work than their souls. To blame are those parents who are regardless of their children. They do not drop in principles of knowledge into them, but suffer them to have their head. They will let them lie and swear, but not ask blessing; read play-books but not Scripture.

But, say some, to catechise and teach our children is to take God’s name in vain.

Is the fulfilling God’s command taking his name in vain? ‘These words which I command thee this day, thou shalt teach them diligently to thy children’ (Deuteronomy 6:6, 7). ‘Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it’ (Proverbs 22:6). ‘Ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord’ (Ephesians 6:4). This threefold cord of Scripture is not easily broken.

The saints of old were continually grafting principles of holy knowledge in their children. ‘I know that Abraham will command his children, and they shall keep the way of the Lord’ (Genesis 18:19). ‘And thou Solomon, my son, know thou the God of thy father and serve him with a perfect heart’ (1 Chronicles 28:9). Sure Abraham and David did not take God’s name in vain! What need is there of instilling holy instructions to overtop the poisonful weeds of sin that grow! As husband-men, when they have planted young trees, they set stays to them to keep them from bending. Children are young plants. The heavenly precepts of their parents are like stays set about them, to keep them from bending to error and profaneness. When can there be a fitter season to disseminate and infuse knowledge into children than in their minority? Now is a time to give them the breast and let them suck in the ’sincere milk of the word’ (1 Peter 2:2).

But some may object that it is to no purpose to teach our children the knowledge of God. They have no sense of spiritual things, nor are they the better for our instructions. I answer:

We read in Scripture of children who by virtue of instruction have had their tender years sanctified. Timothy’s mother and grandmother taught him the Scriptures from his cradle: ‘And that from a child thou hast known the holy Scriptures’ (2 Timothy 3:15). Timothy sucked in religion as it were with his milk. We read of young children who cried ‘Hosanna’ to Christ and trumpeted forth his praises (Matthew 21:15). And sure those children of Tyre had some seeds of good wrought in them in that they showed their love to Paul and would help him on his way to the seashore. ‘They all brought us on our way with wives and children’ (Acts 21:5). Saint Paul had a convoy of young saints to bring him to take ship.

And again, suppose our counsel and instruction does not at present prevail with our children, it may afterwards take effect. The seed a man sows in his ground does not presently spring up, but in its season it brings forth a crop. He that plants a wood does not see the full growth till many years after. If we must not instruct our children because at present they do not reap the benefit, by the same reason we should not baptise our children, because at present they do not have the sense of baptism. Nay, by the same reason ministers should not preach the Word, because at present many of their hearers have no benefit.

Again, if our counsels and admonitions do not prevail with our children, yet ‘we have delivered our own souls’. There is comfort in the discharge of conscience. We must let alone issues and events. Duty is our work; success is God’s.

All which considered, should make parents whet holy instructions upon their children. They who are of the family of God and whom he has adopted for children, will endeavour that their children may be more God’s children than theirs. They will ‘travail in birth till Christ be formed in them’. A true saint is a loadstone that will be still drawing others to God. Let this suffice to have spoken of the signs of adoption. I proceed.

The fifth particular to be discussed is the love of God in making us children. ‘Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God!’ (1 John 3:1). God showed power in making us creatures, but love in making us sons. Plato gave God thanks that he had made him a man and not a beast, but what cause have they to adore God’s love, who has made them children! The apostle puts a ‘Behold’ to it. That we may the better behold God’s love in making us children, consider three things.

1 We were deformed. ‘When I passed by thee and saw thee polluted in thine own blood, it was the time of love’ (Ezekiel 16:6, 8). Mordecai adopted Esther because she was fair, but we were in our blood, and then God adopted us. He did not adopt us when we were clothed with the robe of innocence in paradise, when we were hung with the jewels of holiness and were white and ruddy; but when we were in our blood and had our leprous spots upon us. The time of our loathing was the time of God’s loving.

2 As we did not deserve to be made children so neither did we desire it. No landed man will force another to become his heir against his will. If a king should go to adopt a beggar and make him heir of the crown, if the beggar should refuse the king’s favour and say, ‘I had rather be as I am, I would be a beggar still’; the king would take it in high contempt of his favour and would not adopt him against his will. Thus it was with us. We had no willingness to be made children. We would have been begging still, but God out of his infinite mercy and indulgence, not only offers to make us children, but makes us willing to embrace the offer (Psalm 110:3). ‘Behold what manner of love, is this!

3 It is the wonder of love that God should adopt us for his children when we were enemies. If a man would make another heir of his land, he would adopt one that is near akin to him. No man would adopt an enemy. But that God should make us children when we were enemies; that he should make us heirs to the crown when we were traitors to the crown; oh amazing, astonishing love! ‘Behold what manner of love, is this! We were not akin to God. We had by sin lost and forfeited our pedigree. We had done God all the injury and spite we could, defaced his image, violated his law, trampled upon his mercies, and when we had angered him, he adopted us. What stupendous love was this! Such love was never shown to the angels! When they fell (though they were of a more noble nature, and in probability might have done God more service than we can, yet) God never vouchsafed this privilege of adoption to them. He did not make them children, but prisoners. They were heirs only to ‘the treasures of wrath’ (Romans 2:5).

Let all who are thus nearly related to God, stand admiring his love. When they were like Saul, breathing forth enmity against God; when their hearts stood out as garrisons against him, the Lord conquered their stubbornness with kindness, and not only pardoned, but adopted them. It is hard to say which is greater, the mystery or the mercy. This is such amazing love as we shall be searching into and adoring to all eternity. The bottom of it cannot be fathomed by any angel in heaven. God’s love in making us children is a rich love. It is love in God to feed us, but it is rich love to adopt us. It is love to give us a crumb, but it is rich love to make us heirs to a crown.

It is a distinguishing love that when God has passed by so many millions, he should cast a favourable aspect upon thee! Most are cut out for fuel, and are made vessels of wrath. And that God should say to thee, ‘Thou art my son’, here is the mirror of mercy, the meridian of love! Who, O who, can tread upon these hot coals, and his heart not burn in love to God?

The sixth particular is the honour and renown of God’s children. For the illustration of this, observe two things:

I. God makes a precious account of them.

2. He looks upon them as persons of honour.

1 God makes a precious account of them. ‘Since thou wast precious in my sight . . .’ (Isaiah 43:4). A father prizes his child above his estate. How dearly did Jacob prize Benjamin! His ‘life was bound up in the life of the lad’ (Genesis 44:30). God makes a precious valuation of his children. The wicked are of no account with God. They are vile persons. ‘I will make thy grave for thou art vile’ (Nahum 1:14). Therefore the wicked are compared to chaff (Psalm 1:4), to dross (Psalm 119:119). There is little use of a wicked man while he lives and no loss of him when he dies. There is only a little chaff blown away, which may well be spared. But God’s children are precious in his sight. They are his jewels (Malachi 3:17). The wicked are but lumber which serves only to ‘cumber the ground’. But God’s children are his jewels locked up in the cabinet of his decree from all eternity. God’s children are ‘the apple of his eye’ (Zechariah 2:8), very dear and very tender to him, and the eyelid of his special providence covers them. The Lord accounts every thing of his children precious.

Their name is precious. The wicked leave their name for a curse (Isaiah 65:15). The names of God’s children are embalmed (Isaiah 60:15). So precious are their names that God enters them in the book of life and Christ carries them on his breast. How precious must their name needs be, who have God’s own name written upon them! ‘Him that overcometh, I will write upon him the name of my God’ (Revelation 3:12).

Their prayers are precious. ‘O my dove, in the clefts of the rock, let me hear thy voice, for sweet is thy voice’ (Canticles 2:14). Every child of God is this dove. Prayer is the voice of the dove, and ’sweet is this voice’. The prayer of God’s children is as sweet to him as music. A wicked man’s prayer is as the ‘howling’ of a dog (Hosea 7:14). The prayer of the saints is as the singing of the bird. The finger of God’s Spirit touching the lute-strings of their hearts, they make melody to the Lord. ‘Their sacrifices shall be accepted upon mine altar’ (Isaiah 56:7).

Their tears are precious. They drop as pearls from their eyes. ‘I have seen thy tears’ (Isaiah 38:5). The tears of God’s children drop as precious wine into God’s bottle. ‘Put thou my tears into thy bottle’ (Psalm 56:8). A tear from a broken heart is a present for the king of heaven.

Their blood is precious. ‘Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints’ (Psalm 116:15). This is the blood God will chiefly make inquisition for. Athaliah shed the blood of the king’s children (2 Kings 11:1). The saints are the children of the most High, and such as shed their blood shall pay dear for it. ‘Thou hast given them blood to drink for they are worthy’ (Revelation 16:6).

2 God looks upon his children as persons of honour. ‘Since thou wast precious in my sight, thou hast been honourable . . .’ (Isaiah 43:4).

God esteems them honourable. He calls them a crown and a royal diadem (Isaiah 62:3). He calls them his glory: ‘Israel my glory (Isaiah 46:13)

God makes them honourable. As a king creates dukes, marquises, earls, barons etc., so God installs his children into honour. He creates them noble persons, persons of renown. David thought it no small honour to be the king’s son-in-law. ‘Who am I that I should be son-in-law to the king?’ (1 Samuel 18:18). What an infinite honour is it to be the children of the High God, to be of the blood-royal of heaven! The saints are of an ancient family. They are sprung from ‘the Ancient of days’ (Daniel 7:9). That is the best pedigree which is fetched from heaven. Here the youngest child is an heir, a co-heir with Christ who is heir of all (Hebrews 1:2; Romans 8:17). Consider the honour of God’s children positively and comparatively.

Positively: They have titles of honour. They are called ‘kings’ (Revelation 1:6); ‘the excellent of the earth’ (Psalm 16:3); ‘vessels of honour’ (2 Timothy 2:21).

They have their escutcheon. You may see the saints’ escutcheon or coat-armour. The Scripture has set forth their heraldry. Sometimes they give the lion in regard of their courage (Proverbs 28:1). Sometimes they give the eagle in regard of their sublimeness. They are ever flying up to heaven upon the two wings of faith and love. ‘They shall mount up with wings as eagles’ (Isaiah 40:31). Sometimes they give the dove in regard of their meekness and innocence (Canticles 2:14). This shows the children of God to be persons of renown.

Consider the honour of God’s children comparatively; and this comparison is double. Compare the children of God with Adam; with the angels.

Compare the children of God with Adam in a state of innocence. Adam was a person of honour. He was the sole monarch of the world. All the creatures veiled to him as their sovereign. He was placed in the garden of Eden which was a paradise of pleasure. He was crowned with all the contentments of the earth. Nay more, Adam was God’s lively picture. He was made in the likeness of God himself. Yet the state of the meanest of God’s children by adoption is far more excellent and honourable than the state of Adam was, when he wore the robe of innocence, for Adam’s condition, though it was glorious yet it was mutable, and was soon lost; Adam was a bright star, yet a falling star. But God’s children by adoption are in a state unalterable. Adam had a ‘posse non peccare’, a possibility of standing, but believers have a ‘non posse peccare’, an impossibility of falling; once adopted, and ever adopted. As Isaac said, when he had given the blessing to Jacob, ‘I have blessed him and he shall be blessed’ (Genesis 27:33). So may we say of all God’s children, they are adopted, and they shall be adopted; so that God’s children are in a better and more glorious condition now than Adam was in all his regal honour and majesty.

Let us ascend as high as heaven and compare God’s children with the glorious and blessed angels. God’s children are equal to the angels, in some sense above them, so that they must be persons of honour.

God’s children are equal to the angels. This is acknowledged by some of the angels themselves. ‘I am thy fellow-servant’ (Revelation 19:10). Here is a parallel made between John the Divine and the angel. The angel says to John, ‘I am thy fellow-servant.’

The children of God by adoption are in some sense above the angels, and that two ways.

The angels are servants to God’s children (Hebrews 1:14). Though they are ‘glorious spirits’, yet they are ‘ministering spirits’. The angels are the saints’ servitors. We have examples in Scripture of angels attending the persons of God’s children. We read of angels waiting upon Abraham, Moses, Daniel, the Virgin Mary etc. Nor do the angels only render service to God’s children while they live, but at their death too. Lazarus had a convoy of angels to carry him into the paradise of God. Thus we see the children of God have a pre-eminence and dignity above the angels. The angels are their servants both living and dying; and this is more to be observed, because it is never said in Scripture that the children of God are servants to the angels.

God’s children are above the angels, because Christ by taking their nature has ennobled and honoured it above the angelic. ‘He in no wise took the nature of angels’ (Hebrews 2:16). God by uniting us to Christ has made us nearer to himself than the angels. The children of God are members of Christ (Ephesians 5:30). This was never said of the angels. How can they be members of Christ, who are of a different nature from him? Indeed metaphorically and improperly Christ may be called the head of the angels, as they are subject to him (1 Peter 3:22). But that Christ is head of the angels in that near and sweet conjunction, as he is head of the believers, we nowhere find in Scripture. In this respect therefore I may clearly assert that the children of God have a superiority and honour even above the angels. Though by creation they are ‘a little lower than the angels’, yet by adoption and mystical union they are above the angels.

How may this comfort a child of God in the midst either of calumny or penury! He is a person of honour. He is above the angels. A gentleman that is fallen to decay will sometimes boast of his parentage and noble blood; so a Christian who is poor in the world, yet by virtue of his adoption he is of the family of God. He has the true blood-royal running in his veins. He has a fairer coat of arms to show than the angels themselves.

The seventh particular to be explained is to show the glorious privileges of God’s children; and what I shall say now belongs not to the wicked. It is ‘children’s bread’. The fruit of paradise was to be kept with a flaming sword. So these sweet and heart-ravishing privileges are to be kept with a flaming sword, that impure sensual persons may not touch them. There are twelve rare privileges which belong to the children of God.

1 If we are children, then God will be full of tender love and affection towards us. A father compassionates his child. ‘Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him’ (Psalm 103:13). Oh the yearning of God’s bowels to his children! ‘Is Ephraim my dear son? Is he a pleasant child? My bowels are troubled for him, I will surely have mercy upon him, saith the Lord’ (Jeremiah 31:20). Towards the wicked God’s wrath is kindled (Psalm 2:12). Towards them that are children, God’s repentings are kindled (Hosea 11:8). Mercy and pity as naturally flow from our heavenly Father as light from the sun.

Some may object: But God is angry and writes bitter things. How does this stand with love?

God’s love and his anger towards his children are not in opposition but ’showing a difference’. They may stand together. He is angry in love. ‘As many as I love I rebuke and chasten’ (Revelation 3:19). We have as much need of afflictions as ordinances. A bitter pill may be as needful for preserving health as a julep or cordial. God afflicts with the same love as he adopts. God is most angry when he is not angry. His hand is heaviest when it is lightest (Hosea 14:4). Affliction is an argument of son-ship. ‘If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons’ (Hebrews 12:7).

Oh, says one, surely God does not love me. I am none of his child, because he does not follow me with such sore afflictions. Why, it is a sign of child-ship to be sometimes under the rod. God had one son without sin, but no son without stripes. God puts his children to the school of the cross, and there they learn best. God speaks to us in the Word, children, do not be proud, do not love the world; ‘Walk circumspectly’ (Ephesians 5:15). But, we are ‘dull of hearing’; nay we ’stop the ear’. ‘I spake to thee in thy prosperity, but thou saidst, I will not hear’ (Jeremiah 22:21). Now, says God, I shall lose my child if I do not correct him. Then God in love smites that he may save. Aristotle’ speaks of a bird that lives among thorns, yet sings sweetly. God’s children make the best melody in their heart, when God ‘hedgeth their way with thorns’ (Hosea 2:6). Afflictions are refining. ‘The fining pot is for silver, and the furnace for gold’ (Proverbs 17:3). Fiery trials make golden Christians. Afflictions are purifying. ‘Many shall be tried and made white’ (Daniel 12:10). We think God is going to destroy us, but he only lays us a-whitening. Some birds will not hatch but in time of thunder. Christians are commonly best in affliction. God will make his children at last bless him for sufferings. The eyes that sin shuts affliction opens. When Manasseh was in chains, ‘then he knew the Lord was God’ (2 Chronicles 33:13). Afflictions fit for heaven. First the stones of Solomon’s temple were hewn and polished and then set up into a building. First the saints (who are called ‘living stones’) must be hewn and carved by sufferings as the corner stone was, and so made meet for the celestial building (Colossians 1:12). And is there not love in all God’s Fatherly castigations?