Greetings! I’m Fred Zaspel, executive editor here a Books At a Glance, and today we want to continue our conversation with David Garner, professor of systematic theology at Westminster Theological Seminary here in Philadelphia, and the author of the new book, Sons in the Son: The Riches and Reach of Adoption in Christ. If you missed our previous discussion you’ll want to catch up with that here on the Books At a Glance website.
David, welcome back, and thanks for talking to us again on this wonderful subject.
Garner:
Thank you; delighted to be here.
Zaspel:
Okay, just for a quick review and catch-up, tell us what the doctrine of adoption is, why it represents such high privilege for the Christian, and the significance of your title – Sons in the Son.
Garner:
I would argue, just simply this: that we do not have anything from Christ that was not first attained by him and he is identified in his resurrection as the Son of God in power. I think what Paul is doing in Romans 1 is identifying Christ having attained a new and unprecedented status of sonship, and it is that Christ, that chosen adopted Christ in his resurrection is the one to whom we are united. And it is so, therefore, that adoption is a comprehensive category, I argue, for understanding the very essence of the gospel by which we are united to the resurrected Son of God.
Zaspel:
In what sense is our adoption not yet? What is the blessing and privilege of adoption that still awaits us?
Garner:
Well, you know, it’s interesting the way in which Paul – in fact this question would quickly draw me to Romans 8, which speaks both about the realized dimension of our adoption and the unrealized dimension of our adoption. Fascinatingly, in Romans, chapter 8, verse 23, we see the apostle Paul speaking of the consummate eschatology, that last day in which we enjoy the redemption of our bodies and he equates the redemption of our bodies with our adoption as sons. For Paul, in some vital way, our transformation in our resurrection is coterminous, it is informing of what it actually means to be adopted. For Paul, adoption in its consummate state is something that is tied to our full bodily resurrection as glorified children of God. What is not realized then, of course, is that bodily resurrection and that full manifestation of our sonship by virtue of our transformation in the power of the spirit of the Son of God. So what is interesting, I think, in Romans 8, is that Paul will speak about an inaugurated reality by virtue of our receiving the Spirit of adoption, but also a yet-to-be-consummated reality in our bodily redemption. But there is an organic connection, for Paul, in terms of the progressive sanctification that is part and parcel of the sons of God who are united to Christ the resurrected Son and that final transformation at the last day.
Zaspel:
Usually the doctrine of adoption is treated as a category of Systematic Theology. How does Biblical Theology inform the doctrine of adoption?
Garner:
Well, just methodologically, I would suggest that we ought to always have our exegesis and biblical theology shape any notion of systematic theology, and I seek to do that in this book. The short answer is, how does Biblical theology inform the doctrine of adoption? It does so comprehensively and richly. I would suggest that the way in which Paul uses the term, huiothesia, which is the Greek word for adoption, actually is quite significant in terms of its biblical theological contours. Let me just try to explain that briefly, if I might. The word, huiothesia, interestingly, only shows up five times in Paul’s letters. And that might, just on its own terms, lead us to think that it may not be all that important to Paul. I think we can disabuse that notion of its insignificance quickly when we do even a quick survey of the way in which the term is used.
Let me begin by the way in which Paul does so in the opening chapter of Ephesians. Paul situates adoption in view of pre-temporal purpose of God. From before the foundation of the world adoption is the goal of God’s redemptive purposes in history as Paul unveils for us in Ephesians 1:3-6. It provides, if I could put it this way, the proto-logical context, pre-temporal, even, context for the doctrine of adoption. And then when you move to Galatians 4, we see that at the center of adoption realized for the redeemed is the work of Christ Jesus, the Son of God has sent, born of woman, born under the law, that he might redeem those under the law that we might receive adoption as sons, as Paul puts it in Galatians 4. So there is not only adoption purposed, but there is adoption accomplished in Christ Jesus on the stage of history.
When we get to Romans 8 and 9, interestingly, Paul, in those chapters, situates it in the grand scheme of covenant history; beginning from creation with a view towards consummation. But he also, in Romans 9, interestingly, describes adoption as the first in the list of the old covenant blessings that are tied to Israel. As Paul is building his apologetic case for the faithfulness of God in Old and New Testaments coming to their fruition in Christ Jesus, the first of the benefits that he mentions is that adoption. I think that’s best understood in a typological fashion, harkening back to Exodus, chapter 4, in verses 22 and 23. And so, Paul, then, if you can see where we are going with this, you’ve got adoption in a pre-temporal context in Ephesians 1, a Christological context in Galatians 4, a typological context in Romans 9. And then, as we talked about just briefly a moment ago, there’s the eschatological and pneumatological spirit-thrust of it in Romans 8. Inaugurated in Romans 8:15-17, and then consummated in Romans 8:23. For Paul, adoption is a concept that covers the entirety of redemptive history and it plays a vital function even in the way in which he speaks about the familial cast to the gospel, of us being brothers and sisters in Christ united to our elder brother, Christ Jesus, by virtue of him being life-giving spirit at his resurrection.
Zaspel:
Distinguish adoption from regeneration, and perhaps also compare the Pauline concept of sonship and John’s concept of childship to God.
Garner:
Sure. Well, very good questions. Actually, the relationship between adoption and regeneration is not something that I address in great detail in the book. It is something I’ve thought a good bit about and want to perhaps address in the future. I would say though, just on the Pauline side of things here for just a minute, I think it’s interesting, while the concept of regeneration is an important theme in Paul’s writing, interestingly, the term for regeneration – the word itself appears in Paul’s writing only once, in the book of Titus. And only one other time does the word rebirth or regeneration appear in the entire New Testament and it’s on Jesus’s lips in the Gospel of Matthew. That being said, the theological content of what we mean by regeneration is abundant in Paul’s thought. In fact, it would be clear, I think, that Jesus is the source of our new life, and He is so as the resurrected Son of God. Paul, I believe it’s in Colossians chapter 3, and verses 3 and 4, describes Jesus as our life. He is our lives. In I Corinthians 15, Paul will say that Jesus, as the risen Son of God comes as life-giving spirit. He is the source of our life. What the notion of adoption does is actually situate that new life in terms of our identity as united to the resurrected Son of God. So the new life conception is directly tied to that filial conception in Paul’s thought. One other thing I might mention, you know, in I Corinthians 1 and 2, Paul spends a great deal of time talking about the epistemological, the cognitive effects of the outpouring of the Spirit upon the church. And we as recipients of the Spirit of the Lord Jesus Christ resurrected, are made spiritually alive, and we’re able then, as Paul puts it, to be spiritually discerning. John Murray describes illumination of our minds as the noetic side of regeneration. So I think because we have the life of Christ, the life-giving Spirit in us, we as the sons of God united to the resurrected Son of God have the life-giving spirit of adoption in us. And as the sons of God, by the Spirit of adoption, we enjoy the full bounty of Christ’s life. So in that way, I think, Paul’s conception of regeneration theologically is directly tied to our identity with Christ Jesus as the resurrected Son of God who has outpoured the spirit of adoption as life-giving spirit of adoption to us. You know John’s Gospel, of course, and even in his epistles, he speaks of new birth, that we are the children of God or, as John 3 puts it, that we are born from above, which I think is the best way to translate that – born anothen concept in John. It’s abundantly clear that for John, the notion of our new life, again, is tied to Christ, who has been raised from the dead. We have new life. We have eternal life. We have abundant life in Christ Jesus the resurrected Son of God. And this new life conception, for John, is also one that is tied to union. It is defined in branch metaphor, for example, in John’s Gospel that reveals that our life is tied to the life of Christ Jesus. So, though John does not use the term adoption anywhere in his writing, he advances this wholly compatible notion of a resurrection determined new life, and John marvels that this new life is ours by virtue of us being the children of God, that we are children of God in the Son of God. So, that filial conception is central to the new life, the regeneration conception, both in Paul and in John.
Zaspel:
You’ve emphasized that adoption is one aspect of our union with Christ. How might this inform or affect the usual Reformed ordo salutis? And maybe before you answer that you could explain what we mean by a Reformed ordo salutis.
Garner:
Well, even the question presupposes that there’s only been one attempt at a Reformed ordo salutis. Of course, the question of ordo salutis is a question of the order of salvation or the organization of the benefits of our union with Christ. How do we understand that? I’m not going to delve into the varying models here. I actually do that a little bit in my last chapter in my book. But let me just simply say that for many the notion of the place of adoption often follows the ordering by which we see it, for example, in the Westminster Confession of Faith or the London Baptist Confession of ‘89. And that is of justification then adoption and then sanctification. So each of these would be viewed as manifestations of our union with Christ with the priority being placed on justification. What I’m actually seeking to argue is that adoption does not belong in the same sort of category as do justification and sanctification, but is actually a broader concept. In fact, if I could put it this way – adoption is the single benefit of union with Christ, not just another benefit like justification and sanctification. But rather, it helps us to understand that our union is a union that is with the son of God. And so, every dimension of our fellowship with him and the benefits that we receive from him, are those benefits in view of who he is as Son of God. So I would argue that adoption is a comprehensive concept so that we are actually justified as adopted sons and sanctified as adopted sons.
So I am, I guess I would say, challenging a typical Reformed ordo salutis to not reduce adoption, as some have, as the other side of justification and limiting it to only a forensic construction, nor am I saying it is only a transformative dimension of our union with Christ vis-à-vis sanctification and glorification, but instead is a comprehensive complex idea by which we attain the full bounty of who Christ is and what he has accomplished for us in his life, death, and resurrection. And adoption embraces all of that.
Zaspel:
Before we sign off, maybe you could give us a brief overview of your book so our listeners can know what to expect.
Garner:
Sure. The book divides into three different sections. And those sections are: first, just dealing with methodology; of how we are going about this. It’s the history and the etymology of the term huiothesia of adoption. And then in the second part, I seek to do an exegetical and theological survey of the key Pauline texts in which huiothesia, the term adoption, appears. And then part three is then moving to considering the biblical and systematic theological implications of those texts and draws us then to a final conclusion about how adoption functions in systematic and confessional theology best understood. What is adoption in Christ? So it’s really three parts laid out that way.
Zaspel:
We’re talking to David Garner, author of the brand new book, Sons in the Son: The Riches and Reach of Adoption in Christ. It’s the newest and best on a wonderful subject, and it’s a book you’ll want to have as you pursue the study on your own.
David, thanks for talking to us!
Garner:
Thank you very much. It’s been a delight.
Buy the books
Sons in the Son: The Riches and Reach of Adoption in Christ