Children, heirs, brothers, and sisters

Meaning

Baptismal regeneration changes the text’s vocabulary of belonging: children of wrath become God’s friends, children and heirs, and fellow-partakers with Christ. Calling believers Christ’s brothers and sisters follows from this renewed relation and introduces their obligation to follow him in humility and Christian virtues. It is not a biological genealogy or an assertion that believers become additional divine persons. The passage decisively excludes worthiness, merit and self-will as the source of this change, assigning it to the Holy Spirit working through baptism. The English “are now made” and “be made like” preserve received status and conformity rather than self-created inheritance.