My JPapa can build anything.  His hands are well suited for tools and he could blindly lead anyone around his work shop.  He made me the beautiful wooden cross pictured above for my new porch.  He effortlessly is a carpenter, a builder, a craftsman; and as smoothly as his hands move across wood, so does his gentleness move across the  people that know him.  I should know, I’m one that knows him.  But in a beautiful twist on grace, I get to be loved in a different light than that of a blood grand-daughter;  for it is not by birth that my life has intersected with his, but by adoption.  This isn’t the first adoption that I have known. I grew up in another adopted family, a Godly family that took in three little girls in pigtails and their young, suddenly single momma.  Though all I saw at the time was Ma-maw cooking in the kitchen every Sunday night, 25 years later, I see God working out a redemption story in my life.  It is as if God is whispering down from heaven saying to me “Amy, do you get it now?  Do you see what I am doing here?”  Both of my adoption stories are not really my stories at all, they are His.  It is because of His love that we are adopted, not by our birth.  It’s grace.  It’s all grace.

I love that there is a unique and mysterious treasure that only God can create hidden in an adoption story.  For anyone that has been adopted into a family, you have been given unique access to the heart of God…because adoption was His idea.  Adoption is the very story of Christ himself.  While we were still sons of slavery, He chose us to be sons to Himself instead.  We have been adopted through Christ.  You and I were taken out of slavery and grafted into a holy vine.  And just when you thought it couldn’t get any better than that, just when you thought that all the grace that was available had been poured out, Paul gives us this little treasure: “So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir.” (Galatians 4:7)  Did you catch that last part?  God has also made you an heir.  For me, in simple everyday life terms, this means that as I grew up I was allowed to sit at the same table as the rest of the “blood family” at Sunday dinners.  This means that when JPapa and JNana introduce me to their friends, they say this is my “grand-daughter”.  And for you and I both, this means that we get to be co-heirs with Christ himself one day in heaven…or as John Gill states it:

“And if a son, then an heir of God through Christ; which is another benefit arising from adoption. Such as are the children of God, they are heirs of God himself; he is their portion and exceeding great reward; his perfections are on their side, and engaged for their good; all his purposes run the same way, and all his promises belong to them; they are heirs of all the blessings of grace and glory, of righteousness, of life, of salvation, and a kingdom and glory; and shall inherit all things, and all “through Christ”: he is the grand heir of all things; they are joint heirs with him; their sonship is through him, and so is their heirship and inheritance; their inheritance is in his possession, it is reserved safe in him; and by him, and with him they shall enjoy it.”

We go from lost to found.  From alone to adopted.  From darkness to light.  From slaves to sons.  Such a beautiful story of adoption.  What a beautiful life we have in Christ.

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For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will with all spiritual wisdom and understanding.  And we pray this in order that you live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light.  For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.  Colossians 1:9-14

Friday:

Today’s focus of prayer from our key passage is:

“For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.” (Colossians 1:13-14)

Heavenly Father, we have come to you this week seeking your blessing for our teachers.  We approach your throne boldly, only by the redemptive blood of your Son.  We have used your very own Word as the basis for all that we have requested.  Your Word, your perfect Word that is alive and active.  We stand in awe that you are a Father that pursues your children.  While we were still sinners, your one and only Son died for us.  The precious Son that you love, died so that your children could choose life.  You came for us Father!  You sought out your lost sheep!  We rejoice today that you will one day bring us into the kingdom of your Son.  We pray that our teachers will live and teach in the joy of this knowledge, and that it would be contagious for their students.  As a school, we wait upon your eventual return with patience.  But for today, equip us to proclaim your gospel to a dark world, that we might win many souls for your kingdom.  Thank you for hearing our requests Father.  Use our school for your divine purpose!  Soli Deo Gloria!  Amen!