| << | Contents | >> |
Articles 2024-2026
In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will (Greek, THELEMA – His design, desire, and determination).
Our destiny is a predestiny. As each of us walks into tomorrow, we are stepping into the unfolding reality of what God purposed for us before the world began. Knowing this truth enables us to live our lives with a confident freedom from fear about the future. And God is working everything that is on the upcoming horizon according to the counsel of His own will.
How does He take counsel from His will? Does He ask Himself what He had previously determined to do in order to decide what He should do in the present? No. God doesn’t need to gain any present insight based on His past thoughts. He is omniscient; He knows everything – past, present, and future.
But He does take counsel from His will as He empowers His people to articulate it. Notice Paul’s previous words. With perfect wisdom God had lavished His grace upon us, making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ (Ephesians 1:9 ESV). He set in motion His plan to unveil His will among His people so that we could then declare what we were hearing.
What do we do when we hear among us the thoughts upon His heart? We worship, we prophesy, we cry out in prayer for Him to bring to pass what we are hearing, we exhort, counsel, and evangelize, we write books, etc. The point is that as we begin to articulate on earth the very thoughts of God, He takes counsel. Not from us, but from His own will that He is making known in our midst – bringing to pass the very works that he purposed from before the world began.
What a privilege. Our Lord has included us in on His work of bringing the thoughts of His own heart into visible expression among the nations. And when we see the things we prayed, preached, and prophesied coming to pass, we can only give glory to Him who authored it all.
The first century Church experienced this work of God. As Jews turned to the Lord, they began to pray the thoughts of God over their friends and neighbors. And as many were then saved in Jerusalem and all across Israel, their lives brought praise to Heaven’s glory.
that we who first trusted in Christ (i.e., the Jewish believers) should be to the praise of His glory.
Then, there were the Ephesian and other Gentile believers.
In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise,
God’s heart for the whole earth, reaching beyond the borders of Israel, began to come into visible expression as Paul, other apostles, and many believers preached the gospel among the nations. And like the believing Jews, when Gentiles heard the gospel and believed, they also were then sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise. God’s expression of signature ownership, His seal, was now being made manifest in the spirit world internationally. What a threat to the powers of darkness!
God had promised Israel that He would pour out the Holy Spirit on His people (Isaiah 32:15). And Jesus had instructed His followers to wait in Jerusalem for the fulfillment of that promise of the Father. But God’s intent was not that His outpoured presence would be exclusive to Israel; He would arise into the whole earth (Joel 2:28).
As a result, the Holy Spirit now in the hearts of God’s people:
…is the guarantee (Greek, ARRABON – the pledge or down payment) of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory.
Who is God’s purchased possession? We are. And there is a future redemption awaiting us – the redemption of our bodies at Christ’s return (Ephesians 4:30, Romans 8:23). On that day, the glory filling our hearts will explode throughout our physical bodies. And then we will be like Him for we shall see Him as He is (1John 3:2). Until that day, we have the presence of the Holy Spirit as God’s pledge toward our full inheritance.
And our full inheritance is God Himself. …we are children of God, and if children, then heirs–heirs of God… (Romans 8:16 - 17). What would you rather inherit – a billion dollars or God? To have Him is to have the Creator of everything as our Father.
Or take the thought of down–payment. How does a down–payment compare with the full price? If you were going to buy a car for $20,000 and made a down–payment of $2000, the full price would be paid with the same sort of currency, only it would be much more. Today, we have God Himself in our lives; He gave us Himself. The Holy Spirit is not a part or portion of God; He is the Lord God Himself present with us. He is heaven’s currency – and yet we know that we must have more of Him.
And so, our cry is “more”. Lord I want to know You more. Reveal more of Your heart to me. Lord, make Your power more manifest among us. From the day that we were first born of the Spirit, our hearts began to cry out for more of Him. That was a God–birthed prayer.
And His presence in our hearts is the guarantee, Heaven’s pledge of more to come.
So, Paul thanked the Lord for the Ephesian believers (Ephesians 1:15 - 16) and prayed:
that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him,
The knowledge of God is both the essence of Christianity and the definition of eternal life (John 17:3). Our great quest in this life is that we may know Him. While we love to read His word, we also long to meet with Him in and through those words of Holy Scripture. While we love to gather with our local churches to sing praises, our goal is to actually know Him in the midst of our praises. To know Him among the saints and to know Him among the lost. No matter where we go, He calls us to be on the lookout for Him.
And when He speaks, He reveals Himself to us. Some have said that there is no more revelation to be had. After all, revelation is inerrant because the One speaking is God. And so, He spoke inerrantly to men of old and gave us the Bible. Since the canon of Scripture is now closed, since there are no more books to be added to the Bible, revelation has ceased. Now all we have is inspiration to study the revelation found in Scripture.
But if that were true, why would Paul pray for the spirit of revelation to be given to God’s people? The answer, I believe is quite simple. It is true that all revelation, all that God speaks is without error. But our hearing is not. When God wanted men to write Scripture, He enabled them to hear and then to write down inerrantly what He was saying. But at all other times when He spoke/presently speaks to His people, it was and is so easy for us to mingle our own interpretations, desires, prideful attitudes, or priorities with what we are hearing.
Again, though God speaks inerrantly, our hearing is colored by a certain degree of mixture.
That is why we need the spirit of wisdom accompanying all revelation. Perhaps our heart attitudes are not totally pure concerning whatever situation we face. Perhaps we need the spiritual wisdom of others around us such as the overseers in God’s house. Then there is the wisdom of our spouses, or of our close Spirit-filled friends. But undergirding it all is that we should be wise enough to sit before the Lord Jesus who is the Wisdom of God and ask Him to make clear in our hearts how we should respond to what we are hearing.
Then Paul prayed:
the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling…
When the Lord called us, there was a hope burning in His heart for us. It was not like the world’s hope which is based on not being able to see into the future. “Gee, I hope everything works out ok.” No. His hope is His confident expectation for us as He sees our whole life from before the world began, to our conception, to our death and then beyond. In other words, it concerns the destiny to which He has called us, our predestiny. But it is not as though His calling was a one-time event; He continues calling us to come, spend time with Him, and respond to His voice. It is there in relational intimacy and faithful obedience that we will over time gain increasing insight into where He is bringing us. Even so, lead on Lord Jesus!
Donald Rumble – May 2024
Search Comments
This page has been visited 0059 times.
| << | Contents | >> |
10 per page