Beloved radio friends, we greet you in the ever-precious and the worthy name of our beloved Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, the only one who is able to bring any man, woman, boy and girl to the Father in eternal relationship. Our study concerning God the Father and his family has emphasized there is only one who can bring us to that Father, and that one is the Son of God himself. For Jesus said, I am the way, the truth and the life. No man cometh unto the Father but by me. May I repeat my radio listener, there is one who is able and who is anxious and willing to bring you to his Father and bring you into a relationship with that Father forever. That is the reason that he came from heaven to this earth. My beloved radio friend, the purpose of these messages that we bring from time to time is that God in His wonderful grace and by the power of His Spirit will bring many precious souls into the knowledge of redemption through faith in the work of our Lord Jesus on the cross and bring those who trust Him as we know He will into that relationship of being the children of God. It is our desire that each one of you who listen can say with thanksgiving, thanks be unto God, I am a child of the Father. We continue considering some of the features that should characterize the Father's children. It is certainly to be expected that the children will have familiar traits and features that will display their likeness to the Father. My beloved fellow believer, do you and I realize how much we should be like God? Do you and I realize how much we should be like our Father as we go through this scene for him and for his glory? Until we reach that desired home above, our Father expects us to develop the characteristics that belong to his children who will honor him. We have touched upon one characteristic. One particular feature, we do not practice. We do not make a practice of sinning. My fellow believer, I trust that like your father, you and I will hate sin. For God does not love sin. He loves the sinner, but God hates the sinner's sin. And may I say, Sin is more alarming and terrible to the Father when he sees it in his child than when he may see it in the child of the devil. For I am sure it must grieve the heart of the Father whenever he may see, and how often he may have to see it, one of his children in a path of disobedience and sin. But we would now touch upon a positive aspect. concerning the features of the Father's children. We not only know, as we have seen, we should not practice sin, but now we would consider the opposite truth. We practice righteousness, meaning we practice right living. Here are the words of God from the Epistle of John again. First Epistle chapter two and the last verse in this chapter, verse twenty-nine. If ye know that he, that is, God, if ye know that God is righteous, ye know that every one that doeth or practiseth righteousness is born of him. If ye know that he is righteous, ye know that every one that doeth righteousness or practiseth righteousness is born of him. Go with me to first John chapter three, if you please, in verse seven. And I want you to notice this. Says John, little children, let no man deceive you. He that doeth righteousness is righteous, even as he, that is, even as God is righteous. This is one of the features of the Father. He is a Father that is righteous. He is a God that is righteous. It is a characteristic, an attribute of his person and of his character. It can be nothing else. God is never unrighteous. You and I, my fellow believer, have been convinced and convicted by the Holy Spirit that we were not righteous. As the Word of God revealed in Romans three, there is none righteous. No, not one. And that was our condition in our unsaved situations. But when the Father redeemed us, when the Son brought us to Himself by the Spirit through the Gospel, we became the children of God. And God expects that as His children, we will practice right living. In chapter three of this epistle in verse ten, listen to these words. In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil. Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother. I'm sure we can recognize again that when Christ comes into the heart and into the soul, when one becomes a child of God, there is to be a change. Instead of wrong living, right living is to be the proper course of action. And thus, the child is seeking to be and should be seeking to be, like the one of whom he is born, even God. For John is speaking of a practical righteousness in our daily life, a righteousness that is according to God's thought. And if you know that God is righteous, said John, you know when you see everyone that is doing righteousness, They are exhibiting, they are proving, they are manifesting the teachers of their Father. And in obedience, they are carrying out the practical expression of the character of God. May I suggest my fellow believer, obedience to the Word of God, obedience to God's commands, will manifest our practical righteousness in his sight. as well as in the sight of all others. What a responsibility this is. We are to walk according to His commandments. And may I suggest, my fellow believer, what are His commandments? Are they not the commandments and the precepts that we have in our New Testament in relation to the truth pertaining to children of God that are in the family? They all display the nature of God. These commandments, these teachings of the New Testament and the Word of God as a whole even, they are the divine channels whereby the new nature, the new life, and Christ Himself, as our life, is able to flow out. My beloved believer, please may I remind you, don't expect to do righteous. Be righteous in your living unless you know what God wants you to do. And you will never know what God wants you to do unless you read His Word. and find in his word what he desires you to be. But one thing is certainly true, one characteristic that stands out as being a child of God is the way you live. Well, did the poet write words that we have sung in the past? What a wonderful change in my life has been wrought since Jesus came into my heart. My beloved, may I say, When Christ comes into the heart of life, when that new life is imparted by God, there will be a great change. May I tell what took place just today as I make this broadcast? Following the close of a preaching service, as I came from the platform, went to the door in the entrance of the church building to shake hands with those who were attending the service. There was a young man, whom I had never seen before, who came to me and said, Are you one of the leaders in this church? Well, I said, I am. And he said, Well, I want to show you something. And he pointed there on the vestibule floor in a corner. He says, I brought back what I stole from this place six years ago. For about six years ago, and not only on one occasion, but unfortunately on other occasions, there had been break-ins where we have had much stolen out of the building. And I'm sure that has taken place in many, many, many towns and in many, many churches. And six years ago, a projector was stolen and a folding electric organ. And he pointed to them, and he said, I brought them back after six years. I looked at him and said, Son, what happened that you brought them back? He said, The Lord saved me. I said, When did he save you? He said, Four years ago, how were you saved, I asked. It was through the reading of a tract, a gospel tract. as I read it upon the street, and God saved me. But he said, I have to confess. It took a long time before I realized I should make right as much as I can to think that I've done wrong. Because he said, I began to take drugs, even though I'd become a Christian. And until I was delivered from that, and brought along by God's grace, he was, He said, I didn't realize. He says, as the tears slow down his cheeks, I should bring these back and make restitution. Beloved, let me say that is one of the best examples to prove that he was a child of God. He knew that he should no longer practice sinning. He knew that he should be practicing right living. and bringing back what he had stolen was one of the best evidences that he was God's child. My beloved, we could multiply such cases, but we can certainly realize one teacher of a child of God, he lives right. He will not practice sinning. He will practice and she will practice right living. Oh, my beloved, God values right living in the lives of its children. Do we, may God grant that every child of God will do so. Father, we pray, in the name of the Lord Jesus, may we honor thy word and live for thy glory in Jesus' name, amen.