On Tuesday, July 28, at roughly 2:45 in the afternoon, a judge said a few words that changed my life forever. The little girl my wife, Jen, and I had been raising for six months — since the day she was born — legally became our daughter.
That sentence may read a little plain on a computer screen, but believe me, it did not feel plain in the courtroom. There were no thunderclaps. The heavens did not open. Nobody brought in a brass band (and even if they attempted, I’m pretty sure the bailiff would’ve put a stop to it.) A judge simply asked us a few questions, a gavel was hammered, and a pen moved across a piece of paper. Courthouses do not generally traffic in poetry, but that afternoon a few legal words became poetry to us. Our daughter received a new name, a new legal identity, a permanent home, and an inheritance. Our family became her family. Our story became her story. Everything that belonged to us now belonged to her — not because she had earned any of it, but because we had chosen to give ourselves to her.
For six months, love had been saying what law could not yet say. That afternoon they finally caught up with each other. If you’ve ever been part of an adoption, you know it can be difficult to explain. Adoption is beautiful, but the beauty grows in soil that has known sorrow. Somewhere beneath every adoption is loss. There are no tidy stories, only people learning to love one another amid circumstances none of them would have chosen. Our road to that courthouse had been paved with prayers, tears, late-night conversations, and long stretches of waiting without knowing what would happen next. We loved this little girl with our whole hearts while knowing that her future was entirely out of our hands — which, come to think of it, is where the future usually is, though some of us expend a great deal of energy pretending otherwise. But that afternoon, the judge spoke, and the waiting was over. The child we had held in our arms for six months would carry our name for the rest of her life.
As I looked at my daughter that afternoon, I was reminded of what Paul says in Galatians 4. When the time was just right, God sent His Son to redeem us so that we might be adopted as His sons and daughters. That’s the Gospel. And to quote the theme from Charis Fellowship Conference a couple of years ago: How *good* is the Gospel? Most of us know the doctrine. We’ve preached it, taught it, and sung it. But every so often, God shows you the doctrine through a little girl in a white dress with yellow flowers who you hold in your arms.
The Gospel does more than change our verdict. It changes our family. We were not standing outside God’s house with our noses pressed against the glass, hoping He might notice how sincere we looked. We were not basically good people who needed a little help finding the front door. Left to ourselves, we were lost in sin — guilty, spiritually dead, far from home, and unable to find our way back. So God came for us. He did not shout directions from heaven. He sent His Son. Jesus entered our wreckage and took on flesh. He lived the life we could not live, loved the Father as we had failed to love Him, and obeyed every law we had broken. Then he carried our sin to the cross.
The true Son was condemned so that rebels could be welcomed. He was cast our so that we could be brought in. He bore the curse so we could receive the family name. At the cross, Jesus cried, “My God, My God, why have You abandoned Me?” so that those who had abandoned God could cry, “Abba, Father!” Our adoption was purchased with the blood of Jesus. Then, on the third day, Christ walked out of the grave. The stone rolled away, death lost its grip, and the door to home swung wide open once and for all eternity.
Everyone who turns from sin and trusts in Christ is not merely pardoned. We are welcomed — not as hired hands, distant relatives, or guests who ought to know when they have overstayed their welcome. We were brought in as beloved children. That is Charis. That is the family name we all claim. That is grace. Grace does not leave us standing nervously on the porch. Grace brings us inside, pulls out a chair, and gives us a place at the Father’s table. Grace places God’s name upon us. It clothes us in the righteousness of Christ and gives us the Holy Spirit, who teaches our frightened hearts to call the holy God of heaven “Father.”
In Christ, everything changes. His righteousness becomes ours. His Father becomes our Father. His home becomes our home. His inheritance becomes our inheritance. Even His resurrection becomes the promise of our resurrection. And we do not earn a single bit of it.
My daughter did not contribute much to the court proceedings that day, aside from being remarkably cute. At six months old, her resume is brief. She did not fill out a form, make a case for herself, or promise to become the sort of daughter we could be proud of. Her primary responsibilities were to look adorable and allow the adults to handle the paperwork, which was probably the wisest arrangement for everyone involved. She simply received what love had chosen to give her.
Church, so it is with us. Our place in God’s family does not rest on the strength of our faith, the consistency of our obedience, the cleanliness of our past, or the fruitfulness of our ministries. It rests entirely on Jesus — His perfect life, His atoning path, and His victorious resurrection.
Those of us in ministry may be especially prone to forgetting this. Somewhere between sermon preparation, counseling appointments, hospital visits, and church meetings, we can begin to forget that we are sons and daughters and not simply hired hands. But the verdict has already been spoken and its remarkably clear. Listen to the good news of Galatians 4:7: “You are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then God has made you an heir.” No longer a slave. No longer an outside. No longer condemned. No longer alone. In Christ, you are a child of God. Your adoption rests on something sturdier than your emotions, your performance, or your ministry results. It rests on the finished work of Jesus Christ. No accusation can overturn it. No failure can erase it. No season of suffering can sever it. You bear his name. You have a place at His table.
That afternoon in the courtroom, I held Willow and wished she was old enough to understand what had just happened. I wanted to tell her, “You are ours. You are wanted. You are loved. You will never have to earn your place here.” She was too young to understand any of that, of course. So I simply held her. Her place in our family did not depend on her ability to understand what the judge had declared. It depended on the promise that had been made over her.
The same is true for us. In Jesus Christ, the father has brought us into His family. Not reluctantly, but joyfully. Not because we are worthy, but because Jesus is. His name is our name. And His house is where we belong.
Written by Josh Rollins