This is my son, Joshua David Porter. I am also greatly blessed with a step-son, Jerome Benton Brunnemer (recently married to Jessica).
As I look at this photograph and think about my sons, there exists an eternally deep love, a great longing and desire for the best of father/son relationships, a glad willingness to lay down my life for them if ever need be. I desire them to learn from my mistakes, I desire for them to find the narrow path and plug their ears to the siren's song of this contemporary world. I desire for them great happiness, wonderful families and all the best that God would have for them.
These desires are deep and rooted in the core of my being. As I have deep love for my sons, so my heavenly Father must harbor deep desires of love for me as His son.
Joshua is flesh of my flesh. Jerome, although not my flesh, was chosen. Adopted if you will. When I made the decision years ago to seek the hand of Jerome's mother in marriage, I also made a conscious decision to bring Jerome into my life and love him as my own son. This was a decision. Many contend that this decision, this choice to love, is perhaps the most precious of all. After all, God has adopted me as His son. I was not born into the chosen family of God (Israel). I was adopted into the family through Christ.
As I have been working my way through Dr. Wayne Grudem's textbook on Systematic Theology, and recently finished my study on Adoption, Wayne said something that struck a chord with me. He said that adoption was perhaps the most precious of God's gifts to us, perhaps even more than or equal to salvation. I decided that I did not understand this comment and perhaps I was risking, by moving forward, a very important lesson. Therefore, as I mentioned in a previous post, I have backed up the bus and am going to park in the doctrine of adoption for a while.
To help me in my quest for deeper understanding of this doctrine, I have chosen Dr. Sinclair B. Ferguson's book, Children of the Living God
I learned about this text from C.J. Mahaney's message at the Resolved Conference, entitled "God as Father".
C.J. Mahaney's message is a powerful one and I highly recommend that you find an hour to give it a listen and wonder in God's gift to us as His Children.
