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Articles 2024-2026
For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now. Not only that, but we also who have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body.
Not only is the creation groaning as the next age is coming to birth, but we who have the indwelling presence of God in our lives also groan as we longingly anticipate the full manifestation of His presence both in us and to us at Christ’s return. Oh, glorious day!
For we were saved in this hope, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one still hope for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance.
The believer’s life is to be marked by an abiding hope/sense of destiny concerning a glory not yet seen but surely to be revealed. And Paul identifies that hope as having eager persevering expectation.
While the world worries about the survival of the planet, believers exult in hope of the glory of God. In fact, Christ dwelling within us is Himself that very hope, bringing the conviction/assurance that there is yet more of Him to be revealed. As Paul pointed out to the Colossian believers:
To them (His saints) God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
Christ within us is Heaven’s personal abiding expectation of coming glory. But how are we to be involved in the presently growing yet also future realization and revelation of God’s glory among the nations culminating in the return of Christ? Paul informs us that we simply do not know how to pray accurately concerning these things and that the longings of the Holy Spirit within us are beyond our ability to understand and verbalize. They are simply inexpressible. But our hope is in the One who fills eternity while simultaneously filling our hearts.
Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered (too deep for words – NASB). Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God.
The Holy Spirit’s sighs, longings, and groanings within us are deeper than any words we can utter. And yet, before the Father, they are specific intelligible intercessions on our behalf. Coupled with this is the wonderful gift of praying in tongues. Praying in the Spirit is not some secondary Christian practice to be utilized just once in a while or for a few minutes each day. It lies at the heart of God’s strategy for His people. He has welcomed us into His own vocalization of His present work of filling the earth with His glory. And what He speaks comes to pass.
That is how He brought forth the heavens and the earth. And it is how He is presently bringing forth the new creation.
As we pray in the Spirit, we are both agreeing with Him and inviting Him to manifest His glory in us. But that means that we are inviting Him to bring change to our priorities, our attitudes, our patience, our thought patterns, etc. As a result, our coming into harmony with His glory will involve some measure of pain. Here is why we need the assurance of Paul’s next words.
And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.
Sometimes, the circumstances He brings us through seem to be anything but good. But since we are those who love Him and keep responding to His loving strategic call, His promise to us is that through those very circumstances, He will implement His good, acceptable, and perfect will both in us and through us. And His goal for us is Christ.
For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.
Jesus was not only God perfectly revealed in human terms, He was also Heaven’s example of perfect human responsive submission to God. So, in our own personal lives, we will only understand our (pre)destiny as we keep our eyes fixed on Christ. Not world evangelism, but Christ and His heart for the world. Not ministry, but Christ and His heart for us to serve others. Not our interpretation of what the present expression of the Kingdom of God should look like, but Christ and His preeminence in us, among us, and revealed through us wherever He sends us. As Paul stated to the Philippian believers:
Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ…
Paul did not suffer the loss of all things for the sake of a cause, but for a person. Jesus had captured his heart. And everything the secular and religious worlds had to offer were as rubbish in comparison. He not only wanted to know Him, he wanted to gain more of Him in his thoughts, his attitudes, his total life experience. Christ had become the focus and the goal of His life.
And God’s (pre)destiny for Paul was that as he fixed his gaze upon Christ, he would be conformed to His likeness. And Jesus would not only be his God, his Savior, and his King, He would also be his elder brother.
Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.
God declared His destiny for us from the realms of eternity. Then He called and justified us within the realms of this present age. And then also from eternity, He proclaimed as accomplished the full glory that we are yet to experience. Wow. Who can actually oppose this amazing God and His purpose among His people?
What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
How can anyone doubt either His commitment or His power to accomplish what He has set out to do among us? See how much He has already committed to the project (e.g., the incarnation, Calvary). And then consider how much He yet intends to do for us, in us, and through us.
He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?
Everything that Heaven has to offer is ours. And it is ours as a gift. The full inheritance awaiting us has to do not with what we deserve, but with the cleansing power of His blood, His great love for us, and then His amazing grace and commitment to bring about what He has promised.
Satan simply has no chance of success in his desire to overthrow the Kingdom of God. He has tried. And today, he continues his attacks against us.
Welcome to the war.
Our adversary will use facts about our failures against us. But Jesus never said that He was the facts. Rather, He said that He is the truth. And the truth is that the justifying power of His blood coupled with His merciful commitment to fashion us according to His own likeness overwhelms the facts about our failures. So:
Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.
What a privilege it is to be a child of God.
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written: “For Your sake we are killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.” Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Donald Rumble – March 2025
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