INTO THE GLORY

INTO THE GLORY

                “For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren.” Romans 8:29

                “Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12: 1, 2.

                Now let us put these two texts together to gain a glimpse of something so grand that it should wake up our innermost being to give praises to the Lord.

                We know that God dwells outside of time and yet we also know that He inhabits all time for He upholds all things by the Word of His power. If God should cease to exist, then this physical universe would also cease to exist at the very same time.

                As kids, my brother and I tried about everything that could be tried and one of these quirky things was to take a ping pong ball that had become dented and to light it on fire. There was a momentary flash of light and instantly there was nothing left but the tinniest bit of ash and the ping pong ball ceased to exist.

                Well I have passed this important piece of information to you so that you won’t have to destroy your ping pong balls, but I do have a point.

                Peter tells us about this saying: “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief in which the heavens will pass away with a fervent heat and the earth and its works will be burned up.” 2 Peter 3:10.

                Poof! It will all be gone like that ping pong ball and then He will create a new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. God doesn’t have to go out and violently chop up trillions of planets and suns: all HE has to do is to stop holding them together and they will instantly vaporize. No more sin, no more decay and death, no more entropy… and the laws of physics and thermodynamics as we know them today will be transformed into eternal energy and everlasting life… and we won’t have to wait around for millions or billions of years for it to happen. I suspect it will be instantaneous. Maybe God has an eternal universe waiting for us in another parallel dimension, who knows.

                Now to our main point: It was for the joy of this coming eternal creation that Jesus endured the cross. God looked at us all, standing on the sea of glass. He saw all of our names and faces. He knew us more intimately than we even know ourselves. Then He went back in time to make it happen. He sent His angels to minister unto those who would be the heirs of salvation. Heb. 1:4 says: “Are they not all ministering spirits, sent out to render service for the sake of those who will inherit salvation?”

                God knew each and every one of us that would be standing on that sea of glass. He knew it before the creation of the world, and knowing us, He initiated the plan of salvation even before sin entered the world. He created a planet with just enough trouble and hardship on it to transform us into sons and daughters of God. He set the stage and He planted two trees and He knew what would happen. He also knew what He planned for us to be throughout eternity and this was something He could not create. He could create angels. He could create trees and air and oceans and animals, but He could not create the kind of being that He wanted to share His throne with Him. WE COULD NOT BE CREATED… WE HAD TO BE MADE… HANDS ON AND PERSONAL. WE HAD TO BE MADE…         and so from the moment He got His hands in the clay and began to form us, he has been making us into sons and daughters.

                I suspect that make the physical part of us was easy… but creating a new spirit in us after the fall and teaching us now to live by that Spirit rather than by our flesh… that was the hard part and it has been a project 6000 years in the making and counting. He not only had to get His hands dirty… He actually had to give His own life to make it possible. That is how infinitely bad sin is and sin is infinitely bad, but only because God is infinitely good. To fall short of His glory of God is to fall infinitely, and therefore it requires an infinite sacrifice in order to restore that which was lost.

                Nevertheless He made us capable of choosing, or not choosing this destiny. Love must be a choice or it is not love. He had to let us choose as to whether we wanted to become a part of His training program or if we wanted some alternative god, some alternative plan.

                But listen: He saw you and me standing on the Sea of Glass and so He sent down His Holy Spirit and breathed His life into everyone that would receive it… and He knew we would receive Him because He had already seen us standing there on the Sea of Glass. Does it not say that whom He foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son?

                Listen, this is in no way unfair. God calls everyone. Look up the word “Many” in your Strong’s and you will see that everything Jesus did He did for the many… for all. But then He informs us that many are called, but few are chosen. That is to say that only a small percentage of the population chooses to come into the discipline of the sons and daughters of God. (That’s what discipleship means. Those who have chosen to enter into the discipline of the Lord in order to be made into sons and daughters… these are His disciples.)

                Isn’t it interesting how so many churches today are seeking to bypass this discipline and give us a free ticket to heaven? They make empty promises when they lower the bar. Yes, salvation is free and Jesus paid the full price for it; but it must be entered into by faith. WE have been bought with a price. The gift is free to choose, but in choosing HIS death in our place we become His. WE are under new management. We have entered into His training program to become sons and daughters of God.

                But this is what is so wrong about the false grace that is sweeping the church today. They take away repentance and the cross and the power of the blood. They avoid completely what Jesus said about being His disciples… How we must deny himself and take up His cross and follow Him. This is absolutely necessary simply because we are incapable of doing even one eternal spiritual thing apart from Him.

                But here is where we lose our vision, because to take up His cross is also to take up a destiny which eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither has it enter into the mind of man what God has prepared for those that love Him.” 1 Cor. 2:9. For the joy set before us, we too can endure the cross, despising the shame in order to reign with Jesus Christ on His throne. But the advantage is that He already died for us so that we, by faith, can enter into His death and thus share in His eternal life.

                We don’t know or understand fully what we shall be in eternity, but we do know that we shall be like Him. And I might add here that what the disciples saw of Jesus after His resurrection was a Jesus cloaked in wool garments and not in the linen garments of His glory. Let me explain:

                There is an interesting, but little known fact about the Day of Atonement. This is the fact that when the High Priest ministered in the sanctuary before God, he took off his outer woolen priestly garments and appeared before God only in his linen under garments. But when he went out and ministered to the people he wore His outer woolen garments. (Linen represents the Spirit while wool represents the flesh being from an animal)) This is a picture of the millennium, when we who reign with Christ will wear our linen garments, (our gloriously glorified bodies) when we minister before the Lord) But when we minister to the people in the outer court, we will put on woolen garments, that is to say, fleshly garments that conceal the glory. We are to be a kingdom and priests unto our God and we will reign with Christ for 1000 years. We will minister to the people and their children and their grandchildren who survived the Tribulation period and made it into the millennial kingdom.

                This is written about in Zechariah 14:16-21 saying: Then it will come about that any who are left of all the nations that went against Jerusalem ( in the battle of Armageddon) will go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts and to celebrate the Feast of Booths.” Read on to the end of the chapter for a description of the coming millennium.

                We know that the Feast of Tabernacles is a picture of the coming millennial reign of Christ when He will rule the nations with a rod of iron. There is, after all, no need for such rule in heaven. Our reigning with Christ has to do with the very real task of restoring all things to the obedience of Christ.

                I suspect that this will be our next training ground. We love the idea of eternity, but we have no idea what it entails. We have lived in a temporary world in which decay and death is continually bringing all things to an end. So how does one operate in an eternal environment? How will you build and sow and reap in an environment where nothing ever decays or dies? Are you really going to pick those flowers or will you choose to leave them in their perfect environment? Here on earth we pick flowers because we want to own them somehow and yet even as we pick them we seal their doom. How then will we treat flowers that can never die? Would we not rather choose to leave them in their perfect place since in Christ we own everything anyway?

                What kind of materials will we use to build houses if we choose not to cut down trees that wave their glorious branches in praise to God? You see, we have much to learn and much to unlearn and Jesus is going to be so glad to share with us the secrets of His eternal kingdom, the mysteries hidden from all ages past. He is training us to rule and reign in an eternal universe based upon eternal principles in which sin or death or decay or rebellion can never rise again and we, who have experienced the tragedy of sin and rebellion, of suffering and poverty and sickness and death, will be those that will keep sin from ever rising again.

                We have been told that it has never even entered into the mind of man the things that God has prepared for those that love Him, so if I can imagine this, then think how much greater our existence will be in eternity. Heaven is not a place where people sit on clouds and play harps. Heaven is grand central station. It is a busy place, filled with activity and purpose beyond our imaginations.

                Right now, a large part of what heaven is engaged in is that of bringing many sons to glory. Heb. 2:10-18. Here on earth we limit our vision to the subject of “good and bad” but really we are learning the difference between that which is eternal and that which is temporary. We spend so much time on temporary things and yet Jesus has called us to seek first the kingdom… the things that are eternal.

                Our lives should be consumed with investing in our eternal inheritance, much more than on our temporary existence, for this life is a mere training ground in which through good times and bad, we are learning how to choose and to live by those things that are eternal.

                Are you preparing to enter into the glory? Even in these last days when it is said that gross darkness will cover the earth and its people the Lord says to us” Arise! Shine! For your light has come and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.” Isaiah 60:1, 2. And just to tickle our imaginations Isaiah 60:8 asks this poignant question: “Who are these who fly like a cloud and like doves to their roosts?” Could this be talking about the glorified saints?

                Like so much of the Old Testament, Isaiah is talking about the coming millennium when the Messiah will reign upon His throne in Jerusalem. (In Israel) And when the heavenly New Jerusalem finally comes down at the end of the Millennium, heaven and earth will be joined together and God will become all in all and Earth, the little grain of sand that has become a pearl, being covered with layer upon layer of grace, will become the center of the universe forever and ever. See Rev. 20:4-8. Rev. Chapters 21 and 22.

                These chapters deal with both the 1000 year reign of Christ on the earth followed by the new heavens and the new earth as the city of God the New Jerusalem comes down from God out of heaven and heaven and earth become one forever.  And the only thing, the only imperfection left in the universe to remind us of our great salvation will be the nail scars in the hands of Jesus and the hole in His side from which came forth His precious Bride. Selah