When Paul says we are God’s offspring, is that a metaphor — or are we actually His kind?
They quote this
They hear ‘you are not children yet.’ Paul still told unbaptized pagans they were His offspring. Covenant sonship sits on top of origin. It does not cancel it.
King James Version
But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.
NRSVUE
But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God.
How we read it
They load this verse as if nobody is a child of God until a later ritual. John is talking covenant: those who receive Christ are given power to become sons in the household sense. Paul still told pagans on Mars’ Hill they were already His offspring — genos, kind — which is why idols fail. Adoption language only works if you are already the kind of being a Father can bring home. A rock does not get adopted.
The Bible answers
Offspring — genos, His kind. That is why you do not carve the Godhead out of gold. A potter-and-clay reading kills Paul’s argument.
King James Version
For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring. Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man’s device.
NRSVUE
For ‘In him we live and move and have our being’; as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we, too, are his offspring.’ Since we are God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the deity is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of mortals.
Father of spirits, set next to fathers of flesh. Two fatherhoods. One of them is not a figure of speech.
King James Version
Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live?
NRSVUE
Moreover, we had human parents to discipline us, and we respected them. Should we not be even more willing to be subject to the Father of spirits and live?
Children, then heirs — joint-heirs with Christ. You do not inherit from a metaphor.
King James Version
The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.
NRSVUE
it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if we in fact suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.
Ye are gods, children of the Most High. Jesus quotes it. He did not think it was a joke.
King James Version
I have said, Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High.
NRSVUE
I say, “You are gods, children of the Most High, all of you.”
Now are we the sons of God. We shall be like Him. Origin and destiny in one breath.
King James Version
Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God… Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.
NRSVUE
See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God… Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is.
Also restored
Doctrine and Covenants 76:24
The inhabitants of the worlds are begotten sons and daughters unto God. Paul in Restoration English.
That by him, and through him, and of him, the worlds are and were created, and the inhabitants thereof are begotten sons and daughters unto God.
Doctrine and Covenants 93:29, 21–23
Man was also in the beginning with God. Intelligence was not created or made.
Man was also in the beginning with God. Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or made, neither indeed can be… And now, verily I say unto you, I was in the beginning with the Father, and am the Firstborn; And all those who are begotten through me are partakers of the glory of the same, and are the church of the Firstborn.
Moses 1:39
His work and glory: to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of His children. That is what a Father does.
For behold, this is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.
Dead Sea Scrolls and related extra-biblical texts that illuminate the same pattern the Restoration restores.
Aratus, Phaenomena 5 — the line Paul quotes in Acts 17:28
For we are indeed his offspring.
Paul does not apologize for the poet. He uses genos as the reason idols fail: you do not sculpt your Father out of metal. If offspring only meant ‘creatures,’ the argument against gold statues collapses. Kind is the point.
Wisdom of Solomon 2:23; 5:5
For God created us for incorruption, and made us in the image of his own eternity… Why have they been numbered among the children of God, and why is their lot among the saints?
Second Temple Jews already spoke of humans as children of God in origin and destiny, not only as a legal nickname after a ritual.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Parley P. Pratt
Pratt said out loud what Paul already implied: God, angels, and men are one race, one great family. That is why ‘Father’ is not a mascot name, why exaltation is children growing up, and why idols are a category error. The later creeds made God a different kind of thing so that ‘offspring’ had to be poetry. Paul did not preach that. He preached genos to pagans who had never been baptized.
God, angels, and men are all of one species, one race, one great family, widely, it is true, separated in degrees of intelligence and purity.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Official teaching: every person is a beloved spirit son or daughter of heavenly parents. That is why the Lord’s Prayer starts the way it does, why Romans 8 talks heirs, and why 1 John says we shall be like Him. The Father remains God. Children do not fire the parent. The street version (‘same species means we dethrone Him’) is their cartoon, not the doctrine.
Latter-day Saints see all people as children of God in a full and complete sense; they consider every person divine in origin, nature, and potential.
Faithful voices only. Most of these are independent — not official Church productions unless marked as such.
Be the first to tell us if this case is strong.
