You are Son, My Beloved, In You I am Well Pleased  Mark 1:12

Have you ever had someone sing about you? Rejoice over you?

Throughout Jesus Christ’s ministry, we are given glimpses into the perfect Father – Child relationship. The very relationship we all long for.  And while many of us are blessed with wonderful earthly dads, even the best of them make mistakes. I know I sure have.  While we need to repent of them and ask our kids forgiveness for them, it is a huge consolation to me that God is bigger than our parenting failures; that God, in Christ, loves our kids infinitely more than I could even on my best day.  He actually sings over them.  Imagine that!  The Creator of the Universe Glories in His Children.  In order to fully grasp this, we need to better understand the Father’s Relationship to the Son.

At Jesus Christ’s Baptism, his inauguration into ministry, the Holy Spirit descends on Christ in the form of a dove and a voice comes from Heaven saying You are my Son, My Beloved, In You I am Well-Pleased (Mark 1:11).  What a beautiful image for us, of the Father lavishing love and affirmation on the Son.  This is a fulfillment of the first servant song in Isaiah 42:1. I just love the ESV translation of that verse – “in whom my soul delights.”

Wow!  The Father’s very being delights in the Son’s very being.  Now consider that Adam was called God’s son[i]. Israel was called God’s son.[ii]  In neither case was He well-pleased with them.  But this man Jesus Christ, God’s own Son[iii] is the New Adam[iv]  and True Israel[v]The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hands (John 3:35). He is the one who has done all things well (Mark 7:37). And because of Christ’s work on our behalf He receives an eternal inheritance from the Father[vi]. Christ actually asks for it with full confidence of the Father’s love for Him! (John 17:4)

What does this have to do with us? Everything! John’s Gospel says right at the beginning (1:12) that “to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.”  This is the great doctrine of Adoption, often referred to as our Sonship.[vii] You see ,there is an extension of Christ as the Son of God to us as Children of God. That is why he is the “firstborn of many brothers.”(Romans 8:29)

As God’s Children through Christ, this is what the Scripture shows in Zephaniah 3:17.  Wait!  Zephaniah? who reads Zephaniah?!  And yet, I was almost brought to tears in thinking of this verse.

The Lord your God is in your midst,
    a mighty one who will save;
he will rejoice over you with gladness;
    he will quiet you by his love;
he will exult over you with loud singing.

Who am I that the Lord would sing over me?! That the creator of the universe would exult over me?! No one, of course. And yet, I am precious in His eyes because of and through His Son Jesus who redeemed me.  That is why Paul says “I want to be found IN HIM (CHRIST), wearing His Righteousness, not mine, through faith in Christ.”[viii] And when we are found IN HIM, The Father looks at us, and sees His Son Jesus, in whom His soul delights, in whom He is well-pleased.

It’s almost as if at Christ’s Baptism when God utters, rather when God declares those words, that great truth – You are My Son, My Beloved, in You I am well-pleased, that The Father in that moment is saying that to us, all of us who are found to be in Christ. That was after all why Christ came.[ix]

This is Gospel! This is Good News!

It is an amazing truth that we can call God Father and that he glories in us. He sings over us. He exults in us!  Do you know God as your Father?  Would you like to?  Repent, and Believe in His Son. Be found in Christ.  Believe in the Gospel.[x]

“to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God,” (John 1:12)

Watch the Short Video Below

[i] Adam as God’s Son – Luke 3:38
[ii] Israel as God’s Son – Exodus 4:22, Hosea 11:1
[iii] Jesus as God’s Son –  John 3:16, Hebrews 1:5, Psalm 2:7,12, Mark 1:1
[iv] Jesus as the New Adam – Romans 5:12-21 , 1 Corinthians 15:45
[v] Jesus as True Israel – Isaiah 49:3 , Matthew 2:15 in Conjunction with Hosea 11:1
[vi] The Son’s Reward – Hebrews 2:6-9, Phil 2:9-11,Rom 14:2, Psalm 2, 110, Heb 1:3
[vii] Our Adoption & Inheritance as Sons – John 1:12, Rom 8:15-17, Gal 4:4-7
[viii] Paraphrase of Philippians 3:8-9
[ix] Christ’s Mission – Mark 1:14,15,28, 1 Timothy 1:15, John 1:12, Phil 3:7-10
[x] Ibid

George Sayour
George Sayour

George is Senior Pastor of Meadowview Reformed Presbyterian
Church (PCA) in Lexington, NC. When he's not pastoring or writing, he's fishing, kayaking and spending time with his family.

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