from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named.

Paul already said we are members of God's household (Ephesians 2:19), and now he says that part of the household is in heaven and another part is on earth.

So either in heaven or on earth, you are a member of the household of God as a believer; that is the truth. It depends on God and not on us. The Father takes responsibility for us. He adopted us into his family and empowers us to be His own. We are his heirs, meaning we have access to what he has.

That it is a family defines how we relate to one another, because we have one father.

Paul has already laid to rest any issue of division between Jew and Gentile believers, saying that in Christ we have become one. And now he is laying to rest any division between those who are on earth and in heaven, saying it is the same Father.

We are not begging God to be our Father; He is our Father. We are privileged; we have a permanent seat at the table. We are not on spiritual probation. We are accepted, we are beloved, we are delighted in, we are doted on, we are welcomed, nay, we have our own rooms and place.

We are not visitors; we have our abode with the Father now and forever. There is no changing that status; there is no diminishing our place as we share in the glory of the Son.

The point is - we are at home.

It is exactly the opposite of what happened in the Garden of Eden with the sin of Adam and Eve, where they were chased out (Genesis 3). Their “lease” was up, and they were run out. They were okay as long as they kept one rule, but once they kicked against that rule, they were kicked out. But now we are in, and there is no kicking us out.

We are in through Jesus, and if Jesus is not going out of God's presence, we are not going anywhere, since we are in Christ.

Adam and Eve stood in their own merits in the Garden of Eden, and they were moved from their standing with God.

Satan tried the same trick with Jesus when He was famished and in the wilderness, and got nowhere (Matthew 4:1–11). He fulfilled all righteousness (Matthew 3:15), and then became sin for us, and now we are the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21). We could not have gotten a better deal; we could not have thought of a better deal if we tried.

When the prodigal son thought of going back to the Father, his best plan consisted of being like the very best slave so that maybe over time he could pay back whatever he had squandered, and he could prove himself worthy (Luke 15:11–19).

But the Father would have none of that. He had a welcome party instead of being given a talking to.

Can you imagine that? The father threw him a party to tell him how much he was valued, even though his thoughts were full of self-condemnation.

His thoughts were not clearly the father's thoughts (Isaiah 55:8–9).

So is our heavenly Father, who is all about restoration. He is the Father, and there is no one like him, not even by a mile. We all fall short, but the Father never falls short.

Such blessing, such joy, such never-ending pleasure in his presence.

The writer of the book of Hebrews presented us with the differences between the old and the new covenant. He said we have not come to a mount that quaked, but to Mount Zion, the city of the living; we have come to an innumerable company of angels and the spirits of just men made perfect (Hebrews 12:18–24).

The point is: it is very cool here. No friction. All the contours of our relationship with God have been smoothed out, and all these were accomplished in Christ. By His wounds we were healed (1 Peter 2:24).

This is obviously not physical healing.

There are gifts of healing as part of the gifts of the Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:9), and when people are sick, they are supposed to ask for prayer (James 5:14–16), but to say that physical healing was accompanied by the death of Jesus on the cross is wrong.

And when Matthew wrote that Christ took away our sicknesses, he said that the words of Isaiah were fulfilled by the stupendous healings Jesus performed while walking the earth, which were unparalleled (Matthew 8:16–17; Isaiah 53:4).

We see healing here and there with Elijah and Elisha, but nothing like what we see with Jesus, where it was a real focal point. And to boot, he raised the dead at will.

Again, there are gifts of healing. But let's not preach that healing was accomplished on the cross, thereby implying that those who are sick lack the faith to appropriate the cross. The cross is where our broken relationship with God was healed.

He was wounded for our transgression. Let’s not make a leap from that to the idea that we are all healed (and we only need to confess hard enough or be holy enough), so that people who are sick feel less than. That is not the way of God, and don’t say healing is the children’s bread (Matthew 15:21–28; cf. Mark 7:24–30). Don’t.

And to say sickness is because of sin is correct, but to say that since sin is taken care of, there must be no sickness is wrong.

Jesus said He was sick, and people visited him (Matthew 25:35–40). Jesus never said His followers would never be sick, even though he said they would lay hands on the sick and they would be healed. The laying on of hands and healing is the gift of healing that can operate at times or most of the time with individuals, as the Spirit wills.

That is the truth. And once we begin to say Jesus dying means we should not be sick, we begin to cross into the territory of “Jesus died, so we must not die,” against the evidence of scripture that says the last enemy that will be defeated is death (1 Corinthians 15:26).

There are contexts to these things, is what I am saying.

We need to be careful. Nowhere in the scriptures did the apostle say that people must not be sick or go to the doctor, or that it is a lack of faith to see a doctor for an examination.

May God help us.