Abba Father, thank you for including me in your family. May my life today reflect your influence, character, mercy, holiness, compassion, righteousness, and love. I want to be like you, my Father. So just as I was born into your family by the power of the Holy Spirit, please fill me with your Spirit today so that I will more closely reflect you in all I do and say. Through Jesus I pray. men.

John 1:12-13 To all who received him, to those who believe in his name, he gave the right to become children of God -- children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God. Thoughts on today's verse We live in a time and culture of rights. "It's my right to ___." Just fill in the blank. But there is one thing we don't have a right to be: God's child. We are given that right by grace through Jesus' coming to earth, living, dying and being raised from the dead. We appropriate it through faith, through which God gives us new birth when we are baptized and reborn through the power of the Holy Spirit (John 3:3-7). To be born of God, to be born from above, to be born again is the gift of adoption into God's family and entitles us to all the rights of heirs in God's house (Galatians 3:26-4:7).