It is hard to imagine a plainer statement, "Only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham". If we are of faith, not works, then we are blessed with our Father Abraham. We ARE his descent, perhaps not in blood, but in fact nonetheless. This truth shapes us in ways we cannot really imagine, it speaks to our family connection to one another, to a larger whole, and beyond that it tells us of our intimate connection to the Most High God. God chose Abraham and told him to teach his children, it is through this blessing that the truth of God was communicated to Israel, and through them to us who though not of Israel by blood, ARE of Israel by Christ. We have been blessed not because we were born to the right family, but because God has made us His Own family! This is the furthest possible point from class politics, the furthest possible point from the social agendas of humanist ideologies… this is the fact that the Sovereign God of the universe has chosen to make a people, and this people is made by FAITH in the risen Christ. It is not works, it is not family ties, it is not money, nor class, nor race nor any other distortion… it is trusting that God would count the death of Jesus as payment for the sins of His own. It is believing that God is not only WILLING to forgive, but actually DESIRES to forgive. It is trusting that the death of one righteous man, freely offered, could be sufficient to atone for the infinite evil of all the sins of His chosen people. It seems too good to be real, but it is the only real thing in all of creation. The cross of Jesus Christ stands at the center of all things and the only path to the blessing of God is by faith in the blood of Jesus shed there! Beloved child, do not set your hope on some vain thing, on some imagined idea, do not put your trust in men or in political movements or groups that promise things they can never deliver… rather, trust in the blood of Jesus poured out for sin, and demonstrated by God as accepted by His resurrection!! In Him, and in NO other, there is hope!!!