Children of God

1 John 3:1-3

All Saints, November 1, 2026

Holy Trinity Cathedral

“Children of God”

When a child is born, family members often remark, “Oh, he looks just like…” Maybe it’s the eyes, or the ears, or the facial expression.  Sometimes they are just being kind, but there is an inner urge to connect with this baby.  We claim the little one as part of the family.  Whether they grow up to look like Mom or Dad, or have familiar gestures or mannerisms, we want them to share our values and traditions, our priorities and goals. In families that foster or adopt others, additions may come from a diversity of race, culture, and experiences. What binds members together is a commitment to love and encourage one another. As we learn from our elders, we grow as brothers and sisters together.

So, what does it mean to be children of God?  All humans bear God’s image.  The Hebrew Scriptures tell the story of the Creator making all living things.  After the plants and the fish and the birds and the animals, God says, “Let us make humankind in our own image” and so “male and female God created them” (Genesis 1:26, 28).  We were made to reflect the fullness of the divine, who is beyond gender and any one picture we have of God. God’s love reaches out to all of humankind.  It calls us to realize who we are.  When the writer says, “see what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God” (1 John 3:1), he is not talking about what others say about us as Christians.  God is the subject of the sentence.  God is the one calling us through love.

We are mostly not very good at being saints.  Individually, we are poor reflections of that splendour and glory.  But we each have the potential to help the purpose of God shine through. Those who recognize God’s love in their lives, who glimpse it in others and know it in their souls, are on their way to realizing they are children of God. And baptism is the first step on the way.

Our journey begins at the font.  With the words of our Lord and the water that is blessed, we are marked with the sign of the cross and made Christ’s own forever. There are many meanings attached to this rite. 

• We participate in God’s will to shape us in the divine image
• We are purified from our sins and all the trauma of our lives that clings to us
• We are sanctified by the invitation of the Holy Spirit into our lives
• We are enlightened to follow God’s way with our minds and hearts
• We are renewed into a new and resurrection view of the world
• We are liberated from the chains that try to bind us and keep us from moving forward in faith

When the writer of the First Letter of John sends his message to the newly formed churches, he affirms that they are to live out their baptism by loving each other in community. Although he was communicating to a little church in Ephesus almost two thousand years ago, every generation of Christians has treasured his words and applied them to their situations.  They come to us this morning as the not-very-saintly saints at Holy Trinity Cathedral, and to Tedd, who will shortly pledge his life to Christ today.  You see, then as now, belief in Jesus Christ as the image of the living God is crucial to who we are as the Body of Christ.  God came into the world to show us how much we are loved, and to call us to love in response.  Jesus teaches that the great commandment, above all other laws and regulations, is to love God, love our neighbours, and love ourselves.

The love that we are called to is what the Greeks called agapé.  This is not just love as duty, or as physical passion.  It stems from a source that is holy and moral, and expresses as unconditional affection, a preference for the other that goes beyond what we get back in return.  When the writer tells us, “see what love the Father has given us” he means that God is dedicating, bestowing that on us as a gift. Not for any reason that we deserve or anything we have done right, but simply because God sees us as his own and wants to be in relationship with us.  God sees the potential in us, and wants to work through us to send more love into the world.

Not everyone knows that kind of love in their lives.  And we, too, will not know it fully until that day when we enter the gates of the eternal kingdom.  Even through baptism we are not fully saints- yet.  We can still sin, and do.  But there is this glorious arc towards the light on which we are called to walk.  By faith we follow.  And, as the writer of First John notes, “What we do know is this, when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is” (1 John 3:2). 

Day by day, we pray that we are continually being remade more closely into the image of God, so that all may know love. This process is what the Church refers to as sanctification.  It is not something we can get right by works.  But through the Holy Spirit, we allow ourselves to be purified and refined.  When we reaffirm our baptismal vows, we are reminded strongly of how to keep becoming children of God. Amen.