Jeremiah 3:19

3:19 “I thought to myself, ¹ 

‘Oh what a joy it would be for me to treat you like a son! ² 

What a joy it would be for me to give ³  you a pleasant land,

the most beautiful piece of property there is in all the world!’ ⁴ 

I thought you would call me, ‘Father’ ⁵ 

and would never cease being loyal to me. ⁶ 

Hosea 1:10

The Restoration of Israel

1:10 (2:1) ⁷  However, ⁸  in the future the number of the people ⁹  of Israel will be like the sand of the sea which can be neither measured nor numbered. Although ¹⁰  it was said to them, “You are not my people,” it will be said to them, “You are ¹¹  children ¹²  of the living God!”

John 1:12

1:12 But to all who have received him – those who believe in his name ¹³  – he has given the right to become God’s children

Romans 8:14-17

8:14 For all who are led by the Spirit of God are ¹⁴  the sons of God. 8:15 For you did not receive the spirit of slavery leading again to fear, ¹⁵  but you received the Spirit of adoption, ¹⁶  by whom ¹⁷  we cry, “Abba, Father.” 8:16 The Spirit himself bears witness to ¹⁸  our spirit that we are God’s children. 8:17 And if children, then heirs (namely, heirs of God and also fellow heirs with Christ) ¹⁹  – if indeed we suffer with him so we may also be glorified with him.

Romans 8:21

8:21 that the creation itself will also be set free from the bondage of decay into the glorious freedom of God’s children.

Romans 9:25-26

9:25 As he also says in Hosea:

“I will call those who were not my people, ‘My people,’ and I will call her who was unloved, ²⁰  ‘My beloved.’” ²¹ 

9:26 “And in the very place ²²  where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’

there they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’” ²³ 

Romans 9:2

9:2 I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. ²⁴ 

Colossians 1:18

1:18 He is the head of the body, the church, as well as the beginning, the firstborn ²⁵  from among the dead, so that he himself may become first in all things. ²⁶ 

Galatians 3:26

3:26 For in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God through faith. ²⁷ 

Galatians 3:29

3:29 And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, ²⁸  heirs according to the promise.

Galatians 4:5-6

4:5 to redeem those who were under the law, so that we may be adopted as sons with full rights. ²⁹  4:6 And because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, who calls ³⁰  “Abba! ³¹  Father!”

Revelation 21:7

21:7 The one who conquers ³²  will inherit these things, and I will be his God and he will be my son.

[3:19]  ¹ tn Heb “I, myself, said.” See note on “I thought that she might come back to me” in 3:7.

[3:19]  ² tn Heb “How I would place you among the sons.” Israel appears to be addressed here contextually as the Lord’s wife (see the next verse). The pronouns of address in the first two lines are second feminine singular as are the readings of the two verbs preferred by the Masoretes (the Qere readings) in the third and fourth lines. The verbs that are written in the text in the third and fourth lines (the Kethib readings) are second masculine plural as is the verb describing Israel’s treachery in the next verse.

[3:19]  ³ tn The words “What a joy it would be for me to” are not in the Hebrew text but are implied in the parallel structure.

[3:19]  ⁴ tn Heb “the most beautiful heritage among the nations.”

[3:19]  ⁵ tn Heb “my father.”

[3:19]  ⁶ tn Heb “turn back from [following] after me.”

[1:10]  ⁷ sn Beginning with 1:10, the verse numbers through 2:23 in the English Bible differ by two from the verse numbers in the Hebrew text (BHS), with 1:10 ET = 2:1 HT, 1:11 ET = 2:2 HT, 2:1 ET = 2:3 HT, etc., through 2:23 ET = 2:25 HT. Beginning with 3:1 the verse numbers in the English Bible and the Hebrew Bible are again the same.

[1:10]  ⁸ tn The vav prefixed to וְהָיָה (véhaya) functions in an adversative sense: “however” (see R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 71, §432).

[1:10]  ⁹ tn Heb “sons” (so NASB); KJV, ASV “the children”; NAB, NIV “the Israelites.”

[1:10]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “in the place” (בִּמְקוֹם, bimqom). BDB 880 s.v. מָקוֹם 7.b suggests that בִּמְקוֹם (preposition בְּ, bet, + noun מָקוֹם, maqom) is an idiom carrying a concessive sense: “instead of” (e.g., Isa 33:21; Hos 2:1). However, HALOT suggests that it functions in a locative sense: “in the same place” (HALOT 626 s.v. מָקוֹם 2b; e.g., 1 Kgs 21:19; Isa 33:21; Hos 2:1).

[1:10]  ¹¹ tn The predicate nominative, “You are…,” is supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[1:10]  ¹² tn Heb “sons” (so KJV, NASB, NIV).

[1:12]  ¹³ tn On the use of the πιστεύω + εἰς (pisteuw + ei") construction in John: The verb πιστεύω occurs 98 times in John (compared to 11 times in Matthew, 14 times in Mark [including the longer ending], and 9 times in Luke). One of the unsolved mysteries is why the corresponding noun form πίστις (pistis) is never used at all. Many have held the noun was in use in some pre-Gnostic sects and this rendered it suspect for John. It might also be that for John, faith was an activity, something that men do (cf. W. Turner, “Believing and Everlasting Life – A Johannine Inquiry,” ExpTim 64 [1952/53]: 50-52). John uses πιστεύω in 4 major ways: (1) of believing facts, reports, etc., 12 times; (2) of believing people (or the scriptures), 19 times; (3) of believing “in” Christ” (πιστεύω + εἰς + acc.), 36 times; (4) used absolutely without any person or object specified, 30 times (the one remaining passage is 2:24, where Jesus refused to “trust” himself to certain individuals). Of these, the most significant is the use of πιστεύω with εἰς + accusative. It is not unlike the Pauline ἐν Χριστῷ (en Cristw) formula. Some have argued that this points to a Hebrew (more likely Aramaic) original behind the Fourth Gospel. But it probably indicates something else, as C. H. Dodd observed: “πιστεύειν with the dative so inevitably connoted simple credence, in the sense of an intellectual judgment, that the moral element of personal trust or reliance inherent in the Hebrew or Aramaic phrase – an element integral to the primitive Christian conception of faith in Christ – needed to be otherwise expressed” (The Interpretation of the Fourth Gospel, 183).

[8:14]  ¹⁹ tn Grk “For as many as are being led by the Spirit of God, these are.”

[8:15]  ²⁵ tn Grk “slavery again to fear.”

[8:15]  ²⁶ tn The Greek term υἱοθεσία (Juioqesia) was originally a legal technical term for adoption as a son with full rights of inheritance. BDAG 1024 s.v. notes, “a legal t.t. of ‘adoption’ of children, in our lit., i.e. in Paul, only in a transferred sense of a transcendent filial relationship between God and humans (with the legal aspect, not gender specificity, as major semantic component).”

[8:15]  ²⁷ tn Or “in that.”

[8:16]  ³¹ tn Or possibly “with.” ExSyn 160-61, however, notes the following: “At issue, grammatically, is whether the Spirit testifies alongside of our spirit (dat. of association), or whether he testifies to our spirit (indirect object) that we are God’s children. If the former, the one receiving this testimony is unstated (is it God? or believers?). If the latter, the believer receives the testimony and hence is assured of salvation via the inner witness of the Spirit. The first view has the advantage of a σύν- (sun-) prefixed verb, which might be expected to take an accompanying dat. of association (and is supported by NEB, JB, etc.). But there are three reasons why πνεύματι (pneumati) should not be taken as association: (1) Grammatically, a dat. with a σύν- prefixed verb does not necessarily indicate association. This, of course, does not preclude such here, but this fact at least opens up the alternatives in this text. (2) Lexically, though συμμαρτυρέω (summarturew) originally bore an associative idea, it developed in the direction of merely intensifying μαρτυρέω (marturew). This is surely the case in the only other NT text with a dat. (Rom 9:1). (3) Contextually, a dat. of association does not seem to support Paul’s argument: ‘What standing has our spirit in this matter? Of itself it surely has no right at all to testify to our being sons of God’ [C. E. B. Cranfield, Romans [ICC], 1:403]. In sum, Rom 8:16 seems to be secure as a text in which the believer’s assurance of salvation is based on the inner witness of the Spirit. The implications of this for one’s soteriology are profound: The objective data, as helpful as they are, cannot by themselves provide assurance of salvation; the believer also needs (and receives) an existential, ongoing encounter with God’s Spirit in order to gain that familial comfort.”

[8:17]  ³⁷ tn Grk “on the one hand, heirs of God; on the other hand, fellow heirs with Christ.” Some prefer to render v. 17 as follows: “And if children, then heirs – that is, heirs of God. Also fellow heirs with Christ if indeed we suffer with him so we may also be glorified with him.” Such a translation suggests two distinct inheritances, one coming to all of God’s children, the other coming only to those who suffer with Christ. The difficulty of this view, however, is that it ignores the correlative conjunctions μέν…δέ (men…de, “on the one hand…on the other hand”): The construction strongly suggests that the inheritances cannot be separated since both explain “then heirs.” For this reason, the preferred translation puts this explanation in parentheses.

[9:25]  ⁴³ tn Grk “and her who was not beloved, ‘Beloved.’”

[9:25]  ⁴⁴ sn A quotation from Hos 2:23.

[9:26]  ⁴⁹ tn Grk “And it will be in the very place.”

[9:26]  ⁵⁰ sn A quotation from Hos 1:10.

[9:2]  ⁵⁵ tn Grk “my sorrow is great and the anguish in my heart is unceasing.”

[1:18]  ⁶¹ tn See the note on the term “firstborn” in 1:15. Here the reference to Jesus as the “firstborn from among the dead” seems to be arguing for a chronological priority, i.e., Jesus was the first to rise from the dead.

[1:18]  ⁶² tn Grk “in order that he may become in all things, himself, first.”

[3:26]  ⁶⁷ tn Or “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.”

[3:29]  ⁷³ tn Grk “seed.” See the note on the first occurrence of the word “descendant” in 3:16.

[4:5]  ⁷⁹ tn The Greek term υἱοθεσία (Juioqesia) was originally a legal technical term for adoption as a son with full rights of inheritance. BDAG 1024 s.v. notes, “a legal t.t. of ‘adoption’ of children, in our lit., i.e. in Paul, only in a transferred sense of a transcendent filial relationship between God and humans (with the legal aspect, not gender specificity, as major semantic component).” Although some modern translations remove the filial sense completely and render the term merely “adoption” (cf. NAB), the retention of this component of meaning was accomplished in the present translation by the phrase “as sons.”

[4:6]  ⁸⁵ tn Grk “calling.” The participle is neuter indicating that the Spirit is the one who calls.

[4:6]  ⁸⁶ tn The term “Abba” is the Greek transliteration of the Aramaic אַבָּא (’abba’), literally meaning “my father” but taken over simply as “father,” used in prayer and in the family circle, and later taken over by the early Greek-speaking Christians (BDAG 1 s.v. ἀββα).

[21:7]  ⁹¹ tn Or “who is victorious”; traditionally, “who overcomes.”