Are we all children of God?

Here is a theological question we hear often.

In the Genesis account of the Creation, God says, “Let Us make man in Our image” (1:26). After six days, God rested, mankind being the primary focus of His affections. The ability to walk in intimacy God, the Divine Romance, is what separates us from all other creation. This is the battleground with evolution, which seeks to remove the value God has placed upon us as the jewel of His creation, classifying us as equals to the fish of the sea, birds of their, and everything that creeps on the ground. This false narrative is designed by the enemy to explain away the relationship God wants to have with us!

So what took place in the Garden of Eden?

When Adam and Eve partook of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, they made a decision, like Satan, to be like God and be independent of Him! Up until that point, all that they needed came from God and their interdependent relationship with Him. When they partook of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, they chose knowledge apart from God. God did not separate from mankind because of sin, but sin is choosing to separate oneself from God, and that transformed the DNA of the human race! 1 Corinthians 15:22 puts it this way, “For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive.” So while we all may still be made in the image of God, because of the sin of Adam, we no longer have the nature of God.

This is a hugely important point. And while one could further argue, if all died in Adam, are we not all resurrected in Jesus, I believe Scripture in its complete context gives us a full picture. Just as Adam and Eve had a choice, as love must have, we are required to respond to God’s love for intimacy to occur (God’s ultimate intention).

God has initiated redemption and a path to rekindled intimate relationship with Him. But as Ephesians 2:8 stated, faith is our response to the grace that has been offered unto us. It is not our belief in God or the doctrines of the church we attend that saves us, but us leaning into and relying on the grace (God’s unmerited righteousness offered to us through the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ). It is an invitation to no longer eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and instead to partake from the Tree of Life, which was also present in the garden, and which is descriptive of Jesus Himself, as we read in John 14:6, that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life!

In John 15:5-6 we read:

“I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and they father them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned.”

Back to the original question: Are we not all God’s children?

John 1:12-13 helps us understand this as well when it says, “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”

Laying a foundation of Scripture and narrative of the story of Genesis until now, keeping in mind WHY Jesus had to go to the cross and be resurrected, the answer to our question is….

No, we are not all children of God.

We are all created in His image, but our nature has become corrupted through the original sin of Adam. That sin nature has been further confirmed in each and everyone of us as we have willing partaken of the same Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, as we have all pursued the lusts of the flesh, the lusts of the eyes, and the pride of life. “As it is written: ‘There is none righteous, no, not one…for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:10, 23).

The invitation that we have been given through Jesus, and the great exchange of His righteousness becoming our own, brings us back into God’s redemptive love story!

This takes the sting out of a religious idea that God is angry at humanity and out to destroy us because of our sin. In contrast, this is a loving, merciful, and compassionate God who has paid the penalty of our sin. “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23).

The story of redemption only makes sense through the lens of God’s goodness and His desire for intimacy with us! Adoption, as sons and daughters, initiated through a loving Father, much as we see in the Story of the Prodigal Son, where the father waited expectantly for the return of son, running to him and kissing him when he saw him coming along the horizon, reveals the heart of God. It is the goodness of God that leads us to repentance (Romans 2:4) and restoration with Him!

With that understanding, may it motivate us to respond each day to God’s grace. Let it stir us towards intimacy and a desire to know Him. His love is enough to change and transform us, and the blood of Jesus to make us righteous and our spirits in union with Him!