to come this Lord's day to continue in our study of the God of all comforts. Paul makes clear in Galatians how we become sons of God by being joined to Christ by faith, baptized into Christ by the Holy Ghost, put into union with Christ. Thus, we are all one in Christ. His identity as God's son subsumes our personal origins as to our identity as God's children. Being one with Christ makes us joint heirs with Him. There has always been an infinite love between God the Father and Christ the Son, as equal persons of the Godhead, loving and delighting in each other for all eternity. Being in Christ, we now partake of that eternal and infinite love. between father and son. This is the unity and love which Christ prayed for in John 17, that we all may be one together with Christ and with our father. We are entangled in the love between the very persons of the Trinity. God also has promised us ultimate perfection in Christ. We have been declared without fault, justified because of Christ's blood shed for us. But one day as God's sons, when we're raised in perfection by Christ, We will be like him because we will finally see him as he is. This is all because being in Christ, we are Abraham's seed and heirs to God's promises through Abraham unto his seed. We are not only children, but grown sons. Once we were under the law, under tutors and governors to lead us to Christ until the emancipation ordered by the Father. That took place when Christ came to redeem us from the law and its punishments, and when we received it by trusting in Jesus to save us. Our elder brother has redeemed all the children of God by being made a curse for us. We who were formerly under that curse of judgment for our crimes against God, Christ paid the just punishment from God for our sins that were laid upon Him at Calvary. Our Lord Jesus was always a son, holy, just, perfect, beloved, in his humanity, obedient to his Father. We were none of those things. We were not natural sons of God. But Christ has perfected us before God, and we are brought into the family of God. We are not perfect in ourselves, but perfect in Christ. By this great salvation, we have all been made sons of God, adopted through Jesus Christ, having been given the Holy Spirit of adoption as sons, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Holy Ghost is implanted in our hearts, the Spirit of Christ, always the Son, is given to each of us who trust in Him. And so we cry, Abba, Father. When an earthly father adopts a son, that son is still alien to the father, because he is not his natural son. Thus that man cannot knit himself and his new son together in spirit. That is why adoptions can go bad with mockers insisting to the son, he's not your real father. But God our father has an unfair advantage. His Holy Spirit is given to his adopted sons. That is why we can embrace God as our father. We are knit together as one by the indwelling of the spirit of adoption. What a great evil to try to alienate children from God their father. Jesus warned against such attacks, declaring that all who do such things would be better drowned in the sea with a millstone about their necks. God has convinced us that we are his sons by giving us the spirit of his son, knitting us together with Christ and with our father in a miraculous way that cannot be compared with the relationship of earthly fathers and their adopted sons These truths provide the Lord's people with great comfort from God that we are his adopted sons and are sealed forever by the Holy Spirit of adoption, which urges us on to treat and love him as our father. And so this morning we go on to make a few comments about Christ's teaching regarding us as God's children coming into the kingdom of heaven. It's important to realize, which I hope to make clear this Lord's Day, why being made the children of God is essential to our salvation. And it's explained by Christ in several passages, two of which we read this morning. We read Matthew chapter 18, and there was a question at the beginning of that chapter. At the same time, his disciples said unto Jesus, Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? And I submit to you that that attitude is reflective of unchildlike behavior as far as the Lord Jesus, as far as God our Savior is concerned. And let me explain. Recall that other places in the gospels there was made mention of the jockeying and the positioning. that some of the disciples participated in seeking the best places in the kingdom. And Christ warned them of the danger of that in different ways. You remember, there was the best place at the feast. He told his people where they should choose the lowest seat. And that way, the king of the feast could invite them to come up further, come up higher, rather than snatching up the best place and then being asked to leave or asked to go and sit in some of the more lowly seats. Other times, some people's mothers got involved in the process, coming to Christ and asking that He would grant to her two sons to sit at His right hand and at His left hand, and Jesus had to gently rebuke that attempt. Others, we can see by their actions, the avarice of Judas Iscariot, who was the treasurer, who was a thief, who apparently decided to betray Christ once he discovered there was not going to be special place for him, according to his ideas and desires, that in fact Christ was going to be put to death. And what was the point of that? He cashed in his lost investment for 30 pieces of silver. So there is this idea amongst the disciples of seeking the best places in the kingdom, a sense of pride, a sense of grasping and so forth, You see, they thought in terms of earthly kingdoms. So there should be dukes, and there should be viceroys, and treasurers, and king's privy counselors, and these exalted positions in which they supposed that they should be key workers because, after all, they were in on the ground floor with Jesus back when he was a nobody, or so they thought. And why wouldn't it be fair that they should be put in the principal places. But this is, I submit to you, an unchildlike attitude, not to say that children aren't greedy and selfish. They don't have any ideas of such exaltation until they get to be just a little bit older. They wanted positions and power and prestige, the disciples did. So how do we get into those slots? What do we have to do? Do we have to serve harder or better? Do we have to have a special personal relationship with the king? How do we gain those exalted positions? So Christ gives them an answer which they of course won't be satisfied with. In verse 2 of Matthew 18, Jesus called a little child unto him, set him in the midst of them, and said, Verily I say unto you, except ye be converted and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Well, of course, that was complete and utter nonsense as far as they were concerned. Who ever heard of a kingdom where little children were the most important members of the kingdom. That just didn't make any sense. This incident, you see, fits in quite nicely with the time, you recall, where they blocked access of the little children to Jesus. We read that in Mark chapter 10 at verse 13. They brought little children. That probably means their parents brought them. that he should touch them, and his disciples rebuked those that brought them. But when Jesus saw it, he was much displeased, and said unto them, Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of God. Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not enter therein. And he took them up in his arms, and put his hands upon them, and blessed them. So Christ says that it is of little children of such as those is the kingdom of God, whosoever shall not receive the kingdom as a little child, he shall not enter therein. Now, a lot of people read this text and get all confused. They believe that Christ is teaching that all little children go to heaven, all physical little children. that Christ is focusing on the physical smallness, youngness, helplessness of little children, that they are to be favored in coming into Christ's kingdom. But if you read the text in context, in both passages, you'll discover that this is not the case. You see, people who take that view of focusing on the physical little children, they have missed Christ's import in these texts. Back to Matthew 18 at verse 3. He said, Verily I say unto you, except ye be converted and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Now, notice that Christ is articulating here little children in the physical realm as a metaphor for spiritual little children. Spiritual children. He makes it clear, for example, that all must come to Christ. All must come to Christ. That's why he was angry when they wouldn't let people bring their children to Christ. He doesn't mean by that that children should be brought to Christ, manhandled to Christ, Just because these people brought their children to Christ didn't mean necessarily that they were Christ's own beloved and blessed ones, that Christ would save them. You see, again, they were focused on the physical manifestation of Christ in his kingdom, that Christ conduct miracles, he could heal the sick, raise the dead. So surely he could bless their children in a substantial way. And of course he could, and he did. He was glad to do so. But the purpose of the teaching is not to exalt actual little small physical children. Although we can derive from this text principles against harming little children, mistreating little children, tempting little children away from what is right. All of those things are certainly wrong. But all must come to Christ. Not only that, all must trust in Christ. Now here is where the physical view of this text breaks down. Christ puts some restrictions upon the salvation of the physical little children. If you look in Matthew 18 at verse 6, you read this, but whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, and then the curse is brought down on any such person. The limitation is to the little children, that is, the physical little children who believe on Him. Anyone who tried to tempt them away from Christ would be sorely punished. But we begin to see that what Christ is saying actually is little children or grown-up adults, physically speaking, the key is the little children who are gods, who've believed on me, be they adults or be they small children. Anybody tries to attack them or draw them away from me, they'll be condemned and cursed for all eternity. He uses the millstone and the drowning images. So we must come to Christ and notice also this, that all must come to Christ as little children. It makes that clear. We read the verse already, but read it again. Verily I say to you, except ye be converted and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Christ is using the image and characteristics of little children physically to display several characteristics of the little children spiritually. who will make up the kingdom of God. The characteristics of the physical little children are a parallel or a picture of the characteristics of God's children who have been taken unto Him by Christ through faith and who must approach Christ with these characteristics which are a parallel to some of the characteristics of physically little Children. So spiritually, what aspects must the little children who come to God spiritually have? Well, what aspects do these little children that are brought to Jesus have? Well, they're little children, so they're weak, aren't they? They're defenseless. They're mostly helpless. They haven't yet learned to fight off older, larger people yet. They're weak. They're small. They're helpless. and they're of inconsiderable worth to the world. Not that parents don't consider their children blessed, but in the scheme of things, children are just in the way of the big enterprise, of the wheels of society. They're in the way. They cry. They're hungry. They have to be changed. They toddle off in the middle of the street to get run over and so forth. Remember, the disciples considered them to be of inconsiderable worth. to the prospect of the kingdom. That's why they didn't want them wasting Jesus' time and taking up his attention. When he had bigger fish to fry, which was to establish the kingdom and incidentally install them into their places of prominence and influence. But little children are inconsequential with regard to the world. They're dependent on others for food and for water and for clothing and for shelter. But here's another attribute of the little children that I think is key. They're also simple and trusting of those kind of people that they know. Little children may be afraid of strangers, mightn't they? Just like the sheep of Christ may be afraid of strangers and flee from strangers. You see, there are a lot of parallels that could be drawn out here. In the real world, physically small children are simple and trusting of those kind people that they know. This is why little children get stolen by evil men who offer them candy. They're trusting and they don't have judgment and discernment to know all the things that older cynical people might try to pull on them. This is why little children are so easily tricked and made the subject of practical jokes. And people laugh at them hopefully in a kind way. And little children are lacking in pretense or power or money. One of the things people rarely notice is that in Mark's gospel, the other passage we read, Mark chapter 10, the story of the little children coming to Christ and of such being the kingdom of heaven is contrasted with what happens right next, which is the rich young ruler coming to Christ. And you see the rich young ruler is the foil or the contrasting physical character that displays the differences between him and between little children, little children spiritually speaking. You see, he had money and power and wealth and knowledge, and he had self-righteousness, didn't he? While he was a grown-up man who could fend for himself, could take care of himself, didn't need other people to help him, and he wanted to come to the kingdom with all of that baggage and with all of that mentality. And so Christ cut to the core of all that, didn't He? That you need to just go ahead and sell everything and give it to the poor and follow after me and gain riches in heaven. And it says that the rich young ruler went away sad because he had a lot of money. You see, he didn't come to Christ as a spiritual little child, did he? It wasn't that he was too grown up that he couldn't come to Christ and receive salvation. It was because spiritually he was too grown up, too self-centered, too much of the natural man and the flesh had taken hold. And he didn't have those spiritual characteristics of little children, of faith and of lack of self-sufficiency and of really an innocence towards the value of all the things that the world values. I noticed that these people who take the teaching of Christ about these little children and assume that it's a promise that all little children physically go to heaven, which of course it is not. Christ is talking about spiritual children primarily and using little children as an image or a metaphor or an explaining device. Those who misconstrue Christ's use of this metaphor of the little children, you see, they make the same mistake as Nicodemus did in John 3, who thought that to be born again referred to a recapitulation of physical childbirth. And how can that happen? That would be a miracle, wouldn't it? And Jesus tried to explain to them, no, I'm talking about spiritual rebirth. To be born again by the Spirit If you're born again by the Spirit, that makes you spiritually a little child, even an infant, doesn't it? But Nicodemus couldn't understand at that time what Jesus was talking to, probably because Nicodemus also embraced a tangible, physical, carnal view of the kingdom of God. We can't make the same mistake of hearing Christ talk about birth and childhood and so forth, even when he talks about it as a spiritual process and conversion, which he does. He says, unless you're converted and become as little children, you cannot see the kingdom of God. You cannot enter into the kingdom of God. We must be careful not to embrace Nicodemus' mistake, if you will, of making it about literal childhood and literal rebirth. It is a spiritual thing. It is a glorious thing. It is a birth by the Holy Ghost. Like physical birth, spiritual birth is outside of our power. You see, Christ says we must be born again. That's not a commandment to us. We can't do that. any more than little children can decide when they're going to be born. They don't have any conscious or mental assent to give to such a thing. All of those are natural physical processes that are outside the control of the child. And so it is with the rebirth that Christ is describing in John 3, the spiritual birth by the power of the Spirit. That's the thing we have to have. That's the thing we need. And so to be converted and become little children does not mean to become little small physical children, but rather to be born again by the Spirit as God's children and having the characteristics which correspond to some of the characteristics which we described are possessed by little physical children. That is a simple faith in Jesus. One that's not polluted with all that cynicism that adults quickly embrace if they have not trusted in Jesus. Powerless to save ourselves. We don't come to Christ and offer Him a good deal in us, you know. We're worthy because of our education or positions in this world or our capabilities in this world. but rather powerless to save ourselves. That is, not self-righteous, not bringing our so-called righteousnesses to Christ and considering that he will take them into account as to our salvation. We come to him, spiritual children, as feeding only upon Christ our living bread, the bread of life sent from heaven for us, the bread that the Father gave to us through Jesus Christ. as defended only by Christ. He is the one that takes care of us and defends us and brings us safe to glory one day when He raises us from the dead. And to be taught by God. to be taught by God. You remember in John 6 at verse 45, it says, Therefore the prophets said they shall all be taught of God. He's talking about God teaching people where they stay taught. Not that God tries to teach people and most of them don't learn anything. He's talking about the ones that are drawn to Christ by the Father. And no one can come to Christ except the Father who sent Christ. Draw that man and Christ will raise that man up at the last day. When you read Matthew 18 at verse 14, you notice this, "...even so it is not the will of your Father which is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish." He's talking about the children of God. He's talking about the spiritual children that have come to Christ through faith, that God has ordained should be redeemed by the Lord Jesus, their elder brother. And so we see that to be made children of God is essential to our salvation. It's not just an added benefit. Christ has made it clear that it's necessary. And it's necessary that we be born again by the Holy Ghost with these characteristics, these spiritual characteristics, in order for us to come to Christ and to be converted, to be saved. We must be converted by the Holy Spirit to be as little children or we will not be able to enter into the kingdom of God. So we lay aside all of our pretense and pride and power and trust in ourselves, our self-righteousness, our reliance in our wealth, in our position, in our stability. These were the very flaws of the rich young ruler who was not ready to surrender up. He wouldn't be converted because he couldn't convert himself. Only the Spirit of God can convert. lost sinners, whatever age they be, little children or the aged, into the spiritual children of God with the characteristics necessary to receive salvation from Jesus Christ by simple faith and to trust in Him for everything and not in ourselves. In the statement of Mark that describes this situation, Christ says that it is not your father's will that any of these little ones who trusted me should perish. That's the key to understanding the view in mind by Jesus Christ. The spiritual children who've trusted in Jesus, God will not allow them to go astray or to fall or to perish. We lay aside all these things. What a comfort to be made children of God, to be given that childlike faith and that trust. Christ also refers to his disciples after the rich young ruler departs and calls them children and exhorts them to understand the teachings and the ministry which he has made towards them. It is a comfort from God to us to be made children of God, to be given that childlike faith and trust. And around the Lord's table, we can remember that we approached this table as spiritual children of God. And that it was essential that we should be so converted before we could come to Christ. And when we were converted, we came to Christ and He received us. And we expressed childlike faith and trust in the promises of Christ, in the work of Christ. And as we partake of this feast, we have in our hearts and minds and on our lips the declaration of how it was Christ redeemed us and saved us and how much he has loved us and how much we ought to love him as well. So let's give thanks for the Lord's table. and for the bread, first of all, that pictures his body that was broken for us. Oh God, our Father, we rejoice in your love for us in delivering up your own son, your own son, whom you're well pleased to save lost children who would not listen and had not learned and would not follow after your voice until your Holy Spirit converted us to be like children. We became the younger brethren of the Lord Jesus when He was incarnate in human flesh and made our offering to take our place to lead us to glory one day. Thank You that He left us this bread to remind us of the body that was broken for us. We pray these things in Jesus' name, Amen. The Scriptures tell us that on the night our Lord was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took the bread and blessed it and broke it and said, take ye, this is my body, which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me. I'd like to ask my father if he would give thanks for the cup that pictures the blood of the Lord Jesus shed to make atonement for us. And the scriptures tell us that after they had supped, he took the cup and he blessed it. And he said, drink ye all of it. This cup is the new covenant in my blood. for the forgiveness of sin. Do it as often as you do it in remembrance of me. And the scriptures tell us that as often as we eat this bread and drink this cup, we do preach the Lord's death until he comes. Let's stand and sing number 70 in the black book. Jesus, thou alone art worthy. Ceaseless praises to receive. For thy love and grace and goodness rise or all our thoughts conceive. Number 70.