Are We All God's Children?

"It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons." Hebrews 12:7-8

Non-Christians, and even certain "Christians," seem to think that we are all God's children. We are all God's creation and we are all made in God's image, but we are not all God's children. Where this heretical concept originated from I do not know, but it is completely false. If you have not been saved by Christ Jesus, if you have not been adopted, if you are not chastised by God, then you are illegitimate children. In other words, you are not children of God. Only genuine Christians are children of God.

"For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, 'Abba! Father!'" Romans 8:15

"And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body." Romans 8:23

"But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, in order that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons." Galatians 4:4-5

"He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved." Ephesians 1:5-6

These verses can only be applied to true, genuine, born again believers. The idea that we are all somehow God's children is a lie placed in people's hearts by the devil so that they erroneously question why a good, loving God would condemn His children to eternity in Hell. The lost are condemned to eternity in Hell because they have broken His laws and are not His children. Any Christians who have swallowed this heretical line of reasoning need to spit it out and get back to the truth of the Scriptures.

"Beloved, now we are children of God..." 1 John 3:2

The "beloved" that John is addressing in his letter are Christians. "Now" indicates that before we were not, and that something has changed. Every single individual who has ever lived on this planet, or ever will, has not been, is not, and will not be a child of God. God only loves those who are His. He knows His own because He chose them in Christ from before the foundations of the world. He is long-suffering with the rest of humanity merely for the sake of those He loves; His children whom He gave to Jesus as an inheritance. Ergo, God does not love everybody and His love is very conditional—not unconditional.