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The Ephesian Connection
...the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory.
The gift of the Holy Spirit is God’s pledge or guarantee that we will one day realize our full inheritance. While we enjoy His presence in our hearts already, we eagerly await the full realization of His promises.
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.
The full harvest that lies ahead is greater than the first fruits we have received. And so, we groan within ourselves as we look forward to the culmination of our salvation, the redemption of our bodies. God’s power and presence which we have experienced in our hearts will then be manifest in our bodies, and the redemption we have received will then be fully made known to all. The return of Christ will indeed bring the fullness of our redemption, and we await that day eagerly.
The salvation we now know as a spiritual reality will on that day visibly touch the physical creation. Sin has infected more than just the hearts of men; it has invaded the whole natural order. The planet groans under its bondage to decay and corruption. Metal rusts, buildings crumble, pollutants degrade the air and water. And in people we see moral, philosophical, and emotional decay as well. The creation groans because it is out of tune with its Creator. So, it waits for the glory of God to be seen in the full redemption of His sons. It will only be as man is restored that the creation can also be delivered from its slavery to corruption.
For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God.
The sufferings we presently experience in the trials of this life are nothing compared with the glory yet to be revealed to us and in us in that hour. On that day, the sudden visible manifestation of God’s glory in His people will impact the earth bringing release from its slavery to decay. Through his sin, the first Adam brought about corruption; through His obedience, Christ, the last Adam has already started the process of removing it.
For the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
When God subjected the creation to frustration, He did so in hope. And as its Creator, He infused His hope into the fiber of the natural order. All of creation has an inherent longing that anticipates the revealing of God’s sons. Therefore, one of the key marks of this age is an abiding hope and expectation of the glory of God. And we who believe look for that glory to be manifest in us.
The earth, marked by enslavement to corruption, hopes for the freedom found in the glory that the children of God presently experience. The Church today is to know great liberty in the present measure of God’s glory in our midst. We are to be characterized by freedom. Not religion. Not legalism, but freedom – to serve, to worship, to obey, and to walk in union with our Lord. Since we are the testimony of His life and purpose in this age, we must learn to live in His glory. While some may settle for religious rules and theological philosophies, we must learn to live in harmony with the glory of His life within us. There we will discover the glorious liberty that is to characterize normal Christianity.
Jesus possessed total freedom to do His Father’s will. Nothing held Him back. Too often, we are restrained from moving wholeheartedly in God’s purpose because of certain hinderances and encumbrances such as the pleasures of this life and the constraints of certain religious traditions. But in His presence can be found the fullness of joy and the freedom to live as He intended.
We must guard against living only according to what seems logical. It is not that God is illogical. But we will not comprehend the ways of His Spirit by simply relying on natural wisdom. Instead, we must learn to live by faith in an active communion with Him where He can then reveal His wisdom and power to us. The problem is that it is so easy to be pulled back out of that place of intimacy by the spirit of this age. And whenever we rely on intellectual reasoning or traditional methods, we can encounter a commensurate loss of freedom – which means that we are experiencing a diminishing of His glory.
True bond-servants of the Lord will only seek to do what they see their Father in heaven doing. And the glory and the presence of God will abide with them (John 14:23). By definition, a slave has no choice about being in servitude, while a bond-servant chooses it willingly (See Exodus 21:1 - 6). It is as we become the Lord’s bond-servants that we will experience true liberty. As we make the choice to live in harmony with His Spirit, in the freedom of obedience, He can then make us an example of Heaven’s glorious liberty to all of creation.
Today the natural order is enslaved to decay and cannot break free. But a complete and final deliverance is coming. The fact that we were created from the dust of the ground testifies of God’s intention to liberate the rest of creation as well. By repenting from sin and turning to the Lord we experience His glory and taste that freedom now. Creation however must continue to wait with an anxious longing for the full manifestation of the glory of God in His sons. Scripture portrays this as travail similar to that of an expectant mother. She may experience both anxiety as well as yearning when her labor pains begin. Similarly, in creation there is an expectation of what is to come, but there is also travail, groaning, and shaking as the future age approaches its time of delivery.
For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now.
At issue then is not simply the end of this present age. We are in a time of birth. As we view the turmoil and shakings in this present generation both among people and in nature itself, it is not something to be feared. Rather, it is a time of anticipation. We stand on the threshold of the age to come. And we are a people not of this age, but of the one to come. So, let us not be caught up in the spirit of this era, lest our faith falter when shakings occur. Instead, let us be filled with the Holy Spirit and be a taste of the future to this generation. Let us rejoice as we see the Lord’s day approaching.
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